Lu Yan’s mouth twitched slightly, and he couldn’t help but complain silently.
"No wonder it’s the cyber version."
Lu Luo, already used to this, led the way ahead. Occasionally, passersby cast fearful glances at Lu Yan as the two quickly arrived at a special building.
The building before them resembled an enormous turret after modifications, with most parts disassembled and only a rusty cannon barrel pointing into the distance.
Lu Yan noticed that the cannon barrel seemed to be directed right at the magnificent City Tax Bureau.
Lu Luo pushed open the door, her face full of joy, shouting:
"Boss Quentin, I’ve brought you a guest!"
Lu Yan observed the room, filled with complex appliances and electronic devices, though most seemed abandoned, with messy monitors piled against the walls.
The man called Quentin by Lu Luo sat behind the counter. Appearing about forty years old, he was a Caucasian; most of his body seemed normal, but his right arm was exceptionally robust, almost as thick as his waist.
His discordant limb looked like a misassembled toy, full of absurdity.
Lu Yan noted the spiritual tattoos covering Quentin’s unusually thick right arm. Unlike the chaotic letters on others, Quentin’s tattoos felt organized, like a mathematical formula or a run-capable code.
Quentin first looked Lu Yan over keenly, then his expression visibly stiffened as he spoke to Lu Luo:
"I’m not doing any business today, try elsewhere?"
Upon hearing this, Lu Luo frowned tightly: "Don’t be like that, Boss Quentin. It was hard bringing you a big client."
"I said no business today; you should leave!"
Quentin said, making a shooing gesture.
Lu Luo looked disappointed, ready to lead Lu Yan to another place, but found him already at the counter.
Lu Yan narrowed his eyes slightly, smiling gently as he examined Quentin before him, his voice drifting weightlessly.
"What...did you see?"
As the words fell, a dark aura began to spread from around Lu Yan, the surrounding lights dimming suddenly.
At the counter, something unseen devoured the room’s light, causing Lu Luo’s sight to blur momentarily, illusionary figures seemingly standing around the counter in the dark background.
However, when he rubbed his eyes and looked carefully, he found nothing around him.
Quentin swallowed, his body starting to tremble involuntarily.
When that ominous cold aura struck, his combat instincts activated his spirit-mutated right arm. Once the spiritual ability code was triggered, his right arm would unleash more than a ton of force.
Yet the opponent made no moves, and the chilling coldness instantly froze his spirit-mutated arm, extinguishing the spiritual ability code just before its activation.
He couldn’t even comprehend what ability the opponent used, feeling as fragile as a child before this person.
"Respec...respected sir, I..."
"I asked you, what did you perceive?"
Quentin’s face flushed red; after hesitating for a while, he whispered:
"I...I didn’t sense any spiritual ability code on you, which made me suspicious of your identity. I declined the business due to fear of the risk."
"Spiritual ability code?"
Lu Yan glanced at the characters on Quentin’s arm, a thoughtful look flashing in his eyes:
"Lu Luo mentioned you’re a Compiler?"
"That’s just hearsay from Lu Luo. I’ve merely touched on some basic spiritual ability codes, able to perform the lowest level of spiritual mutation transformation.
Advanced spiritual mutation transformations require combining biological surgery with spiritual energy potion use, and what I’ve got is just enough to fool some people in Lower City District."
Aligning with Quentin’s information, Lu Yan had a rough guess about the so-called spiritual ability system.
The fundamental part of the spiritual ability system was the spiritual tattoos, which allowed the user to mobilize some spiritual energy by applying spiritual ability codes onto the body.
Most Lower City District residents’ spiritual tattoos were chaotic, mobilizing pitifully little spiritual energy, and among the people Lu Yan had met in the Lower City District, only Quentin had genuinely complete spiritual ability codes.
Lu Yan vaguely sensed that complete spiritual ability codes were enough to give Quentin spiritual power equivalent to one layer of Qi refining, which seemed weak to Lu Yan but barely entered the extraordinary system.
Above that were spiritual ability users transformed through spiritual mutation and biological surgery, though Lu Yan had yet to see a true spiritual ability user, so he couldn’t equate them with cultivation realm levels.
"I heard you can fabricate identities?"
Quentin answered truthfully:
"I can establish records for identities in Lower City District by bribing the police, but if it involves spiritual ability user levels, they’re directly controlled by the Heavenly Intelligent Brain, a level way out of my league."
Lu Yan’s expression remained indifferent as he spoke:
"Prepare an identity for me."
Quentin immediately took out three watch-like personal terminals from under the counter, introducing them to Lu Yan:
"These three terminals all have pre-registered identities corresponding to their files, for use within Lower City District."
Lu Yan casually picked up a black terminal, wearing it on his arm. An instant later, he felt a faint spiritual energy emerge from a chip inside the terminal, scanning his entire body.
Lu Yan’s expression slightly shifted and quickly closed his Dantian, stopping the circulation of heaven until the identity scan was complete and the terminal binding was successful.
Quentin then reluctantly took out a small blue battery, half the size of a finger, from the counter and handed it to Lu Yan.
"This is a second-generation spiritual energy battery; though most of the energy has been used, the remaining portion can still power the terminal for over ten years, even helping activate the spiritual ability code if needed."
Lu Yan accepted the battery, noticing its resemblance to a Spirit Stone changed into a spiritual energy battery, only much larger.
Reaching into his vest, he discreetly retrieved that Spirit Stone battery and tossed it onto the counter.
Quentin’s eyes lit up, exclaiming: "Is this a latest sixth-generation spiritual energy battery?"
"This grade of spiritual energy battery can power exoskeletons and medium spiritual weapons, valued at least ten thousand credit points.
That’s Upper City District pricing; such a treasure can’t be bought in Lower City District!"
Quentin’s excited demeanor made Lu Yan’s eyes reveal a thoughtful expression.
Logically, Spirit Stones are used as currency in the Xianxia version, so when transformed into the cyber version, they ought to equate to currency.
Yet the essence of Spirit Stones is as a standard equivalent in the Cultivation Realm, their intrinsic value being most critical.
The supply of Spirit Stones is limited, whereas in the cyber version, the credit points originate from the Universal Giant Corporation, which, risking financial system collapse, could theoretically issue limitless credit points.
In that respect, the value of Spirit Stones far exceeds that of credit points; their relations in different versions cannot be equated.
This also applies to Spirit Stones and money in the urban version, as they are fundamentally different concepts.
Hence, Spirit Stones morphed into the more valuable and scarcer spiritual energy batteries with each version update.
"If Spirit Stones are , what about the cultivation texts?"
Lu Yan’s mind stirred, ignoring Quentin, who cradled the spiritual energy battery, and retrieved a USB stick acquired in the version update from his storage bag.
Plugging the USB stick into the personal terminal, a document directory popped up.
"Spiritual Ability Code Basics: From Beginner to Heaven"
Opening the file, a large amount of text appeared before Lu Yan.
As he looked at the strings of spiritual ability codes, a hint of amazement flashed in Lu Yan’s eyes, for he recognized most of them.
Because those spiritual ability codes were exactly the array patterns from "Array Profound Mystery!"