Chapter 12

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation  Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

[15th of July, 2022. The water brought by the storm has completely disappeared, and only a thin watery sheen is left. I’ve decided to go out and set Titan upright.]

Shen Cong had brought out his laptop from its ziplock bag and opened the word document named Apocalypse Journal, where he typed in those words. Then, he turned off his laptop before putting it back into the ziplock bag.

He did not know how other people in the post-apocalyptic world continued and just used his own style to survive and live in this place.

He recorded all that he saw every day, the progress of each of his research, and everything that happened that might be of importance. This was a hobby of his that bordered on OCD.

Right then, Titan was lying on the ground, and Shen Cong needed to set it upright so that its tyres touched the ground.

Before he went out, he naturally set up appropriate safety measures.

The unknown monster that bit through the steel bar underground, the monster that resembled the prehistoric crocodile which had tossed Titan around like a toy, the thunderstorm that came as it pleased, and the water level that rose by several meters all made it clear that he was in the post-apocalyptic world. The food chain had been completely upturned, and humans were no longer the creatures who stood at the top.

2Shen Cong spent half an hour on Alloying to infuse Activity into Sky Lifting Pillar 1.0, the Activity armor which had regressed to a suit of normal metal armor.

He then spent another half an hour on Alloying his Type 64 pistol and a metal handheld crossbow so that they contained sufficient Activity.

Then, his process of equipping and protecting himself was considered complete.

Activity was a good entity. Titan could use Alloying on all metallic objects, and while the speed was slower on non-metallic objects, they could still be appropriated.

The 15% of Titan’s parts that were not occupied by Activity before the storm were all non-metallic components that were difficult to conquer.

The imitation Type 64 pistol was made of metal. The last time Shen Cong had created Sky Lifting Pillar 1.0, he had readily controlled Titan to perform Alloying on it.

Shen Cong did not have a firm grasp of the power in the pistol after it was infused with Activity, because he had never fired a shot up till then.

He also had three high-pressure air guns, which were all imitations of submachine guns and rifles, but they had plastic skin. It made it rather problematic performing Alloying on them. Their power might not even be that much stronger than that of a pistol.

Shen Cong put on the Activity armor and let a pair of binoculars hang on his chest and picked up the Activity pistol. He then secured the fang dagger at his waist and an Activity crossbow on his back. Only after that did he jump out of Titan with a jack in his arms.

Shen Cong first carefully inspected his surroundings.

When it came to inspection, Shen Cong had high-tech equipment that was used to serve as e-police, and it was known as DJI Phantom 8 Pro.

He had thought that it would be able to show its glory in the post-apocalyptic world and become his very own e-police.

But reality was completely different. He was in an environment where radiation levels were incredibly high, and high altitude line-of-sight (LOS) propagation was basically useless. The extremely high frequency LOS propagation of Phantom 8 Pro lost its effectiveness because GPS and BDS could no longer detect satellites.

It used the 5.8 G Quadcopter for its LOS propagation and was supposed to have 10 km as its standard for sight distance, but now, its LOS propagation was less than 15 m. Shen Cong did not know whether it was because the wave band serving as its signal was contaminated or something else.

If he had to use a surveillance camera to observe his surroundings from the height of 15 m, he might as well just use his binoculars to look into the distance.

Hence, after using the Phantom 8 Pro once, Shen Cong regrettably put it away. One day, after he had done thorough research on radios and upgraded as well as modified his communication system, he would see whether he could turn the Phantom 8 Pro into a real e-police.

1Right then, he would just inspect the area manually.

When the water subsided, the world seemed incredibly interesting and novel.

After being washed by rain that filled the entire world and was practically a flood, most of the sand and shattered stones that covered the ground were swept away. Hence, there were multiple dried up water channels on the ground. The embankment of the water channels were formed by large stones that the flood was unable to sweep away.

When Shen Cong examined them carefully, he was able to tell that some of them had been used as construction material. Clearly, they had been swept over from the ruins of the large buildings nearby.

Even though the terrain was in pieces and there were holes everywhere, the decreased amount of sand and stones meant that the threat from underground had been reduced.

Shen Cong did not believe that the monsters who ambushed others from the sand, like the earth-digging insect, could dig holes through a scattered pile of stones.

Of course, this meant that the road had become incredibly difficult to traverse too.

‘There’s a bulldozer blade on Titan. If I run into stones obstructing my path, I can push them away.’

Once Shen Cong was certain that there were no dangers around him, he crawled into Titan’s truck compartment and dragged out three huge metal clips. They were a hunting tool he had welded whenever he managed to find time.

Ever since he ran into the large-toothed rat, he began creating bear traps. Since he did not have enough steel and had lost one of his bear traps in Carrefour Supermarket, he only managed to make four.

He tossed the bear traps around Titan to serve as his first line of defense.

It was only then that Shen Cong lowered his guard slightly and used the jack to lift Titan bit by bit.

This was an incredibly troublesome process.

Shen Cong only had one jack, so he was forced to first lift Titan a little before he had to go and bring some stones over to place under the truck compartment so that they could hold it up. Then, he had to slowly operate the jack to lift the truck further before putting stones under there too so that he could lift Titan even higher. Every time he lifted it a little more, he had to choose a stone that was larger than before, and he had to do this repeatedly.

He might have the strength of one and a half bulls, but when he faced Titan, he was still too weak, because it weighed thirty tons.

3While doing that, he also surveyed the area at irregular intervals. He used his binoculars to search for signs of activity in the distance or any danger. That was the reason why he spent so much time on his task.

He started working at three-thirty in the afternoon, and now, it was six-thirty in the evening. The sun was already setting, but by then, Shen Cong was finally able to lift Titan by forty-five degrees Celsius. Its center of gravity started to shift.

4At that moment, Shen Cong suddenly shoved it.

Bang!

Titan took advantage of the power from the shove and flipped over. All twenty-two of its wheels touched the ground without any problem.

3At that moment, when Shen Cong looked at Titan again, he could see that the part connecting Titan’s head and the truck compartment had been warped until it was bent at a very steep angle. Parts of the load bearing bars in the undercarriage were sporting cracks, and the steel armor outside was covered in scratches, grazes, and bite marks that were packed close to each other.

The steel armor had been covered in steel spikes, but now, groups of them were bent because of the pressure from the monster’s attacks.

The lights on the truck head had all shattered.

This was the result of the monster that resembled a prehistoric crocodile wracking havoc on the truck in the water, and it was just the damage on the surface. The internal damage was even worse. Forget about the number of electrical components that were damaged after being soaked in water, the damaged resources in the truck compartment alone were already a huge loss to Shen Cong.

He might have used ziplock bags to protect the important resources, but when Titan was knocked about by the prehistoric crocodile, some of the delicate electrical equipment was still completely destroyed.

‘Once I switch the tyre, I’ll go inside.’

1Shen Cong cast a glance at the sky. After he set Titan upright, he immediately began changing its tyre. He approached a wheel at the end of the truck. It was the one bitten through by the monster.

The tyre was a special one with a diameter of 1.5 m. To install this type of tyre, Shen Cong had modified the undercarriage of a trailer for the truck’s compartment. The distance between the wheels and axles had been increased by a lot.

When Shen Cong just started modifying Titan, he had favored full trailers, which were intermodal containers with two sections.

First, it was because they could carry a rather large amount of cargo. Second, it could break off, which meant that when the situation called for it, he could cast away the second intermodal container. However, when he thought about the problem with dynamic load, he chose an intermodal container with only one section.

Twenty minutes later, Shen Cong successfully switched the tyre, and in the process, he became covered in engine oil.

He hung the punctured tyre at the undercarriage. When he had free time, he could use Activity to slowly repair it. After all, he only had one spare tyre.

1He recollected all the bear traps and cast a final glance at the red sun that was about to disappear behind the horizon and the sky illuminated in reds because of it.

Shen Cong returned to Titan. It had been two days and one night since he last slept.

He had to rest well.

From the next day, he would focus all his energy on guiding Activity to repair Titan.