hotmtlnovel Chapter 92 Soul Power Patterns
Chapter 92 Soul Power Patterns
The materials analysis laboratory at Base 7 is located on the second basement level and is one of the most sophisticated areas in the entire base.
The laboratory wasn't large, about forty square meters, but it was crammed with a dazzling array of instruments. Rows of indicator lights, red, green, and blue, were embedded in the walls, resembling a dense starry sky. The air was filled with the smell of disinfectant and ozone, traces left by the autoclaving system.
The floor is made of a special anti-static material, which feels soft and springy underfoot, with a slight elasticity in your feet with every step. Several cool white shadowless lamps hang from the ceiling, illuminating the entire laboratory as bright as day, so bright that not even a single hair can be hidden.
Li Fulan pushed open the laboratory door, and a blast of cool air hit her. The laboratory is kept at a constant temperature of 18 degrees Celsius all year round. It feels a bit cold when you first come in from the corridor, but you get used to it after a while.
He was carrying a black metal box, which was a "trophy" he had brought back from Douluo Continent—Hu Liena's pair of Blood-Drinking Blades.
The box was opened, and two short blades lay silently inside the shock-absorbing foam. Under the cold white light of the laboratory, they looked even more sinister than they had in Douluo Continent. The dark red sheen on the blades still flowed slowly, like congealed blood, or something alive.
"Where's Engineer Gu?" Li Fulan called out towards the door.
"Here it comes, here it comes."
An elderly man with gray hair emerged from the adjacent lounge, carrying a steaming cup of tea. He wore a wrinkled white lab coat, with three pens tucked into his breast pocket, and his glasses were as thick as bottle bottoms. He looked like an old professor who had traveled from the last century.
Engineer Gu, whose full name is Gu Mingde, is the Chief Technology Officer of the Seventh Base and one of the few people Li Fulan can trust in this world. This old man may not look particularly impressive, but he's incredibly knowledgeable—proficient in materials science, mechanical engineering, and biotechnology. It's said that he participated in several top-secret military projects in his youth, but later, for reasons unknown, he was relegated to this godforsaken Seventh Base to retire.
"What strange things did you bring back this time?" Engineer Gu leaned closer, squinting as he examined the short blades in the box. "These two knives look really weird. Where did you get them?"
"Another world," Li Fulan said directly.
There were no secrets between him and Engineer Gu. It was this old man who discovered his "time traveler" identity, and later the two reached a tacit agreement—Li Fulan was responsible for bringing back all sorts of strange and unusual things from other worlds, and Engineer Gu was responsible for studying them. It was a mutually beneficial and pleasant collaboration.
"Anotherworldly weapon..." Gu Gong's eyes lit up, his excitement making him look ten years younger. "I've been wanting to study those things for a long time. I analyzed the ore samples you brought back before; their composition is unlike any known mineral on Earth, and their crystal structure is also very unique. But those are just raw materials, nothing special. This..."
He put on gloves, carefully picked up one of the short blades, and examined it closely under the light.
"This is the finished product; you can see more details here."
"This is called the 'Blood-Drinking Blade,' a weapon over there called a 'Soul Tool,'" Li Fulan explained simply. "It's said to be made of special materials that can amplify the user's abilities. This blade has a special function—blood-draining. After cutting someone, it can drain their blood and then convert it into the user's power."
"Vampire sucking?" Engineer Gu frowned. "It sounds like some kind of energy conversion mechanism. Let me see..."
He placed the short blade on the worktable and began operating a nearby instrument.
It was an X-ray transmission scanner, capable of penetrating most materials to observe their internal structure. The instrument emitted a slight hum upon startup, and a few seconds later, a tomographic image of a short blade appeared on the screen.
"The material is very unusual." Engineer Gu stared at the screen, tapping and zooming the image with his finger. "The main body is some kind of silvery-white metal, about three times denser than steel, but with roughly the same weight. This doesn't make sense, unless its atomic structure has something special about it..."
He switched perspectives and continued his analysis.
"There are bone fibers mixed in with the metal, arranged very regularly, as if they were deliberately mixed in. The function of these bone fibers... let me think... maybe they're used to increase toughness? To prevent the blade from breaking under high-intensity impact?"
"The people over there call this 'deep-sea sunken silver,' which is a mixture of the bones of some kind of marine monster," Li Fulan added.
"Deep-sea sunken silver... an interesting name," Gu muttered, then switched back to spectral analysis mode.
Lines of data flashed across the screen, displaying the elemental composition of the blade.
"The main components are silver, iron, carbon... and some elements I don't recognize." Engineer Gu frowned as he looked at the abnormal data. "The atomic numbers of these elements are not on the known periodic table. They are either some kind of artificial superheavy element, or... a unique substance from another world."
"It should be the latter," Li Fulan said. "The physical rules of that world are quite different from those here."
Engineer Gu nodded without asking further questions. He had grown accustomed to Li Fulan's occasional remarks about things being "different."
The following analysis is more detailed.
Engineer Gu used an electron microscope to magnify the surface of the blade a thousand times, ten thousand times, one hundred thousand times... Under normal magnification, the surface of the blade looked as smooth as a mirror, without any flaws. But when the magnification exceeded fifty thousand times, some strange things appeared.
"What is this?"
Engineer Gu stared intently at the screen, his eyes practically glued to the screen.
Under magnification of 100,000 times, the surface of the blade is no longer smooth. Instead, it is covered with a dense layer of lines. These lines are extremely fine, only a few hundred nanometers wide, and are impossible to see with the naked eye. They resemble circuit diagrams etched onto the blade, interconnected to form an extremely complex network.
"These patterns are all over the entire blade." Engineer Gu manipulated the microscope's field of view, observing various parts of the blade. "From the tip to the handle, they're everywhere. And they're arranged very neatly, not like they're naturally formed, but more like they're man-made."
"Man-made carving? At the nanoscale?" Li Fulan raised an eyebrow.
In this world, nanoscale precision machining is not impossible, but it requires extremely advanced equipment. How could such technology possibly exist in Douluo Continent, a place teeming with Soul Masters and where Soul Tools are entirely handcrafted?
"Wait, let me take another look..."
Engineer Gu then pulled up another set of data.
"The material of these patterns is different from the main body of the blade." He pointed to the spectral analysis results on the screen. "The main body is deep-sea silver, but the patterns are made of another material, with extremely high energy conductivity and almost no resistance. It's somewhat like a superconductor, but not entirely..."
He fell into deep thought, his fingers tapping rhythmically on the table.
"I need to conduct an experiment," he suddenly said. "Could you release some of that 'energy' from over there? You mean that kind of...soul power?"
Li Fulan paused for a moment, then nodded.
He extended a finger and gently touched the blade. A faint wisp of soul power seeped from his fingertip and flowed into the Blood-Drinking Blade.
In that instant, the image on the screen changed drastically.
The previously dim nanoscale patterns suddenly lit up, like a lit fuse. The light spread rapidly along the patterns, covering the entire blade in the blink of an eye. Under an electron microscope, one could clearly see the soul power flowing within those patterns, being accelerated, gathered, and amplified, ultimately forming a faint halo around the edge of the blade.
The dark red luster on the blade became even brighter, as if it had come to life.
"I see!"
Engineer Gu slammed his hand on the table, nearly knocking his glasses off.
"These patterns are an 'energy loop'!" He excitedly walked around the lab, gesturing as he went. "When you inject energy, these patterns guide the flow of energy, causing it to move along a specific path. During this movement, the energy is accelerated and concentrated, ultimately producing a specific effect!"
He turned and stared at Li Fulan, his eyes gleaming with fanaticism.
"It's like... a circuit board! Except it doesn't transmit electric current, but your 'soul power'! Those patterns are the wires and components, responsible for guiding and processing energy!"
Li Fulan nodded thoughtfully.
Engineer Gu's analogy was very apt. If you compare a soul tool to an electronic device, then the blade is the outer casing, the deep-sea silver is the substrate, and the nanoscale patterns are the circuit diagrams printed on the substrate. Soul power is like electric current, flowing along the circuit and ultimately driving the device to produce various functions.
"And what about the 'blood-drinking' function?" he asked. "Can it be analyzed?"
"Let me see..." Engineer Gu sat back down at the computer and began to carefully analyze the structure of the patterns.
This process took a long time. The patterns were incredibly complex; just scanning them once took two hours. Engineer Gu input the scan results into the computer, allowing AI to help analyze the patterns.
More than an hour later, the analysis results finally came out.
"The entire circuit can be roughly divided into three parts," Engineer Gu said, pointing to the 3D model on the screen. "The first part, at the edge of the blade, is a 'absorbing array.' When the blade cuts into the target's body, this array automatically absorbs the life force contained in the target's blood."
He zoomed in on that area and could see dense, fine lines extending towards the edge of the blade like tree roots.
"The second part, located in the middle of the blade, is the 'transformation circuit.' The absorbed life force is processed and transformed here into an energy form that the user can utilize."
He then switched to a view of the middle section of the blade, where the patterns were more intricate, forming a swirling structure.
"The third part is at the handle, which is the 'feedback interface.' The converted energy is output from here and transmitted to the user through the hand holding the handle."
After Gu finished speaking, he frowned.
"But this system has a major problem." He pointed to a spot in the conversion circuit. "The design here is flawed. A lot of energy leaks out during the conversion process, and this leaked energy seeps back into the user's mental system. Long-term use will lead to mental pollution, making the user bloodthirsty and irritable."
"Huliena said she's been resisting that influence," Li Fulan said. "It seems to be true."
"This design... how should I put it, the idea is right, but the workmanship is too rough." Engineer Gu shook his head, looking disgusted. "It's like a circuit diagram drawn by an elementary school student. It works, but it's inefficient and has safety hazards. If I were to design it, I could at least triple the efficiency and completely eliminate that mental pollution problem."
Looking at the dense patterns on the screen, Li Fulan already had an idea in mind.
Since the essence of a soul tool is an "energy circuit," and the technology of this world far surpasses that of Douluo Continent in terms of circuit design, does that mean... he can use the technology here to improve or even redesign those patterns?
If possible, he could not only repair Hu Liena's Blood-Drinking Blade, but also mass-produce even more powerful soul tools.
Although firearms are powerful
However, those above the Soul King level have enough reflexes to dodge damage from firearms.
Above the level of Douluo, the ability to refine soul tools can amplify the power of Soul Douluo and even Title Douluo even further.