Chen Ci put his hand down and ignored the squid's cry for help.

He came to Fu Tianhe with a crowbar and squatted down. Alpha was dismantling the squid's exoskeleton. This layer of steel armor was almost a pile of messy metals randomly pieced together. Apart from being able to be sold to a smelter, it had no other value.

Fu Tianhe wanted precision parts. At a time when materials were scarce, although metal recycling was expensive, it was too heavy, and the two of them couldn't carry much, so it was better to get something with a high cost-performance ratio.

There was already a pile of metal pieces thrown on the beach. Chen Ci took out the tools from Fu Tianhe's bag and joined the dismantling.

After learning relevant theories from Fu Tianhe and being taken by him to the garbage dump several times, Chen Ci has become proficient in disassembling garbage.

The two of them worked together to remove the exoskeleton, revealing the inside of the squid's head and torso.

Chen Ci saw the sticky, wriggling internal organs. The ink flowing out of the broken ink sac dyed everything black, and the stench was overwhelming.

Fu Tianhe was not interested in its biological structure, and neither was Chen Ci.

In the capsule under the skin on the back of the body, the long olive-shaped inner shell is also composed of machinery, and together with the cartilage, it constitutes the endoskeleton of the cuttlefish.

The mental force easily found the hidden mechanical parts in the biological tissues.

Just as Chen Ci thought, primitive creatures of such a huge size and high degree of mechanization basically all have a mechanical core.

"In my heart."

Fu Tianhe really didn't know where the crowbar's heart was. He poked around with a crowbar but couldn't find the correct location. Instead, he was annoyed enough.

Chen Ci simply took the crowbar from him, went to the middle and back side of the squid's abdominal cavity, inserted the more than one-meter-long crowbar, and then poked it upwards to pick out the pericardium with its aorta attached.

Fu Tianhe's eyelids twitched at the scene. Matchstick, who finally mustered up the courage to move a little closer, turned his head away and gasped loudly.

However, Chen Ci remained calm.

Fu Tianhe calmed himself down, took out a knife and cut out the heart.

The soft and rotten biological tissue was thrown on the ground in a huge ball. Thanks to years of collecting garbage, Fu Tianhe could still breathe and was not suffocated by the fishy smell.

Alpha began to look for the mechanical core hidden in its heart. Chen Ci turned around and pressed his hand on the squid's body wall again.

The voice in my head has become extremely faint, and there is no doubt that it will eventually slide into the eternal silence of death.

It was killed.

Chen Ci's heart was calm.

Should he be moved? Should he feel pity or sympathy? After all, this thing had been crying out to him miserably for help just a few minutes ago, struggling to stay alive.

Maybe he would feel a little sad when a human died in front of him, or more likely, like now, he would feel nothing.

Chen Ci pressed his chest lightly, his heart beating steadily at 75 beats per minute.

But in a sense, it was empty.

It was already daybreak, and the entire abandoned suburb was obscured by the shadow cast by the main body of Cinnabar. The tide was gradually receding, exposing more shallow beaches and leaving behind many small crustaceans that were unable to leave in time.

Fu Tianhe found the mechanical core in the squirrel's heart. He walked to the beach, washed the flesh and blood off the core, and put it into the inner layer of his backpack.

Important parts were removed, but most of the machinery was piled up next to the body like garbage.

The three set out again to find the matchstick's camp. The remains of the squid will gradually decay over time, and eventually only a black mechanical shell will be left, leaving future generations to guess what kind of creature it is.

Just like the jellyfish Chen Ci found on the second floor of the office.

Chen Ci touched it for the last time before leaving, but he could no longer hear anything.

And eight hours ago.

Cinnabar top floor, imperial palace.

Chen Nian saw Gui Zhiqi off and returned to the bedroom with satisfaction.

It was already late, and according to Chen Ci's schedule, he should just wash up and rest.

His brother sent him many interesting photos. The vast ocean presented completely different scenery from different angles, with majestic waves and hidden dangers. Maybe he should ask Shafley to take him to the Global Ocean Base sometime to experience it up close.

Just tell Shafla right now.

The terminal Chen Nian is currently using is under the surveillance of the White Tower. Any messages sent will be uploaded. If there is anything, he is still used to talking to Shafla in person.

Chen Nian thought about how Shafley had said at noon that he had something to do next, and he hadn't seen him the whole afternoon and evening.

Is he going to handle related matters? As the eldest prince, what does he usually do?

Chen Nian couldn't help but feel a little curious. You know, today's human society adopts the elector system. Each beacon has its own elector, who has major autonomy.

The emperor is elected by the electors and rules over all mankind.

In Chen Nian's understanding, the royal family is more like a spiritual leader. They don't have so many things to do. So what did Shafla do?

"Where is Shafulai?" Chen Nian asked the smart butler.

The smart butler answered truthfully: "His Highness is in his room."

"In his room?"

"Yes, His Highness has been in the room the whole time."

Chen Nian thought Shafulai had gone out. After hearing the smart butler's explanation, he got up from the bed, walked straight out the door and turned left.

Chen Nian raised her hand and gently knocked on Shafley's door.

If Shafuli is busy with something important, the smart butler will not open the door for him. On the contrary, if the door opens in front of him, it means that he has finished his work.

Chen Nian's abacus was clacking, and then he saw Shafulai's door open silently in front of him.

Chen Nian stepped in and closed the door.

At this time, Shafulai should be ready to rest after finishing his work. Chen Nian stood in the living room and called out softly a few times, but there was no response from Alpha.

But the smart butler clearly said he was in the room, was he taking a shower? If he was in the bathroom, he should have been able to hear him come in.

Chen Nian walked lightly, looking for Shafulai.

The bedroom door was inexplicably ajar. Chen Nian passed by and took a look through the crack.

He swore he had only glanced subconsciously.

He was shocked by the scene before him and stopped in his tracks.

Shafley was seen sitting on a metal chair, his arms flat on the armrests, his legs naturally apart, sitting upright.

A dozen black leather belts extended from the wall, securing Shaflay's shoulders, arms, chest, abdomen, waist, hips and legs.

The leather band was very tight. Chen Nian could clearly see that Shaflay's chest muscles were bulging and rising and falling slowly with his breathing. The fabric was forced to stick close to his skin, and his skin color was faintly visible through the white shirt.

The black trousers and leather goods matched the bound thighs, which also showed the fleshiness, making Chen Nian couldn't help but think of some harmless and elegant tastes.

And on Shaflay's head, he wore a huge silver-gray device.

A strangely shaped helmet covered Shafulai's face, revealing only a pair of thin lips and chin. The lip color was normal and pale. Some telescopic tubes hung on both sides. Chen Nian didn't know what they were used for, but if they were regarded as decorations, they were not bad.

The scene before him was so shocking, especially when Chen Nian saw it through the narrow gap in the door, it had a strong and secretive sense of voyeurism.

——Who would have thought that the taciturn eldest prince would tie himself up like this behind closed doors?

Chen Nian took a deep breath, and he had to admit that his face was burning with shame at this moment.

In the nightclub in the underground city, Chen Nian has seen a lot of things. In the black box, there are not only guests with special fetishes, but also colleagues with special skills. There are even Alphas kneeling on the ground, holding a whip and begging Chen Nian to whip him.

But none of them could compare to the huge impact the scene before him brought to him.

"Can I come in?" Chen Nian asked softly.

"Your Highness, please feel free to do as you please." said the smart butler.

Chen Nian pushed open the door as quietly as possible, walked into the bedroom, and sat down on the bed opposite Shafley.

As he got closer, Chen Nian noticed every detail more clearly.

The chair was directly fixed to the wall to ensure that it would not be easily shaken. Shafry's muscles were tense, indicating that he was in a state of concentration.

On the table next to him was a portable terminal, a state-of-the-art model. All the pages were closed, but the desktop was still lit on the screen.

Chen Nian recognized that the device on Schaffleicher's head was a neural adapter, but it did not seem to be any known model currently on the market.

If he was playing a game, there would be no need to tie himself up like this, unless Shafley really had some shameful fetish.

Chen Nian had never thought that he would encounter such an interesting scene. He crossed his legs and sat relaxedly on the soft big shablet bed, waiting for the moment when the neural adapter would be removed by Alpha.

Only after the last string of code disappeared from his sight did Shaflay finally let go of Cinnabar's hand.

"Everything is normal." Shafley whispered, resisting the strong sense of dislocation. No matter how many times he had done it, he still couldn't adapt to the dizziness of jumping from the program library.

--Thanks for your hard work.

The girl nodded to Shaflay, then turned her head to look at another figure who looked exactly like her behind her, and raised her hand to touch the other person's shoulder.

The moment the two touched, Cinnabar's hand melted from between his fingers, and as if with some kind of suction, it merged into the other body in liquid form.

In a blink of an eye, Cinnabar returned to her original appearance. She was still looking up at the sky. Shaflay followed her line of sight and saw nothing but darkness.

Perhaps there was something that he, as a human, could not see.

The rain is still rising towards the sky. The so-called coolness and wetness are all sensory stimulations brought by electrical signals after data simulation.

Shaflay didn't know what else was hidden beneath the gray and black surface of this alien space.

His mission was accomplished.

"If there is nothing else, I will take my leave."

——Okay, if there is anything, I will call you.

Cinnabar looked at him, and she put cinnabar on both sides of her lips, so that any change in her expression would be more obvious.

Shaflay had seen raw cinnabar, and it was indeed the same color as Cinnabar's pupils.

Shafley nodded in agreement, raised his hand, wrote a line of code in the air, and the paper-thin door reappeared in front of him.

Taking one last look at the strange scene around him, Shaflay pushed the door open and left Cinnabar's program core.

The alien space began to fold from infinity and eventually shrunk into a small cube under his feet. Shaflay fell down and the simulated image disappeared directly in his mind.

He opened his eyes and saw the small house with white walls and red roof in the green field in the adapter lens, standing quietly in the distance that was always out of reach.

Program repair consumes a lot of mental energy. Every time he exits the space, Shafulai will feel dizzy for a long time. Otherwise, he would not need a specially made mental adapter. He would not have this feeling when playing games.

Shaflay sat quietly and rested for a while. When the nausea gradually subsided, he breathed a sigh of relief.

The smart butler extended a robotic arm and removed the neural adapter for him.

The dim light in the bedroom illuminated the scene in front of him, allowing Shaflay to see the boy opposite him at a glance.

Chen Nian sat on the edge of his bed, legs crossed, one hand supporting the bed, the other hand on her knee, chin supported, looking at him with interest.

The top button of the boy's shirt was undone, revealing his neck and a small part of his collarbone. He was probably preparing to rest, so he was not wearing an anti-bite collar.

The feet under the trousers are bare, one stepping on the carpet, the other hanging in the air, the instep of the foot lightly stretched, from the ankle to the toes, drawing a graceful arc.

The dim light made everything look ambiguous, and even my breathing became lighter.

——Why is Chen Nian here?

Shaflay subconsciously wanted to move, but he was tightly bound by the dozen leather straps on his body. The oppression and suffocation made his brain, which was dizzy due to the neural adapter, even more sluggish.