Chapter 315 Controlled fusion
When Zhou Yingxue heard Ren Xiaosu address her as “auntie,” she couldn’t hold it in any longer. Thinking of how she was only 25 years old and still in her prime, how did she end up being called an auntie?
Of course, Ren Xiaosu did not really think that Zhou Yingxue was old. It was just that he had seen her outside before.
The people from the Intelligence Service who were watching Ren Xiaosu thought their tailing operation was flawless. They even believed that Ren Xiaosu was extremely stupid to not have noticed them.
But actually, Ren Xiaosu purely didn’t care about them as he just wanted to heal from his injuries.
Besides, it would have been better if they had gotten some nanosoldiers to come and keep watch on him. Normal people were not able to arouse Ren Xiaosu’s interest in the slightest.
However, Zhou Yingxue was not an average person either. She said with a smile, “At my age, it’s more appropriate if you address me as big sister. Are you familiar with the library?”
“No.” Ren Xiaosu shook his head.
Zhou Yingxue was stunned. He had been coming to the library every single day for almost half a month now, yet he was saying he was not familiar with it?
She continued with a smile, “I’m looking for a book titled The Theory of Time. Do you know where it is?”
Ren Xiaosu looked up at her. He had already given an attitude, trying to distance himself from her, yet she still persisted in striking up a conversation with him.
But at this moment, the voice from the palace said, “Quest: Help the knowledge seeker determine the correct location of the book.”
Ren Xiaosu was stunned. Why did this quest have to be assigned to him now of all times? Moreover, the quest even specifically stated it had to be the correct location, so he could not just point to a random spot. However, he really did not know where the book was.
He would have to do the quest no matter what. He looked at Zhou Yingxue and tried his luck by saying, “The Theory of Time must be in this library. Why don’t you look for it yourself?”
Zhou Yingxue was taken aback by the answer. ‘You might as well say that the book is inside Stronghold 88! Of course I know it’s in this library!’
However, Ren Xiaosu didn’t care about that. He thought that since the palace was just asking him to pinpoint the correct location, it wouldn’t be wrong to say that the book was right here in the library, right?
The voice from the palace said, “Quest complete. Awarded Basic Skill Duplication Scroll.”
Ren Xiaosu wanted to give his own ingenuity a thumbs up. There was probably no one else who could match him in terms of exploiting loopholes when it came to doing quests!
Seeing how awkward it was, An Yuqian quickly found the book titled The Theory of Time and handed it to Zhou Yingxue. Zhou Yingxue got very frustrated but could not vent.
At this moment, a group of people came into the library from outside. It was Wang Yuchi and the others.
When they came to the table where Ren Xiaosu was, they were a little taken aback when they saw Zhou Yingxue sitting there as well. They were used to sitting together at this table to study by themselves.
If Zhou Yingxue was seated here, they would have a stranger in between them. That would make it very awkward, and they would have to be very careful with their words.
They would often discuss some secretive topics during their conversations. After all, they knew too much, so they would unintentionally bring it up while talking.
Zhou Yingxue knew these people wanted to sit together with Ren Xiaosu, but she just pretended to focus on her book and sat there without any intention of excusing herself.
Someone wanted to ask Zhou Yingxue if she could change seats but was stopped by Wang Yuchi. “The library is a public place, so we have no reason to disturb others from reading where they want.”
Ren Xiaosu gathered the books in front of him and said, “Let’s switch tables.”
The library was very large, and there were a lot of tables other than this one. As such, their entire group went to another table and left Zhou Yingxue there to continue reading by herself.
Meanwhile, Zhou Yingxue sat there for the rest of the entire afternoon reading The Theory of Time. She had to do so in order to portray that she was really here to read so as not to arouse Ren Xiaosu’s suspicions. No one really knew whether she could even absorb what she was reading.
Zhou Yingxue was a little frustrated. She did not lack suitors! How could she not even have enticed the young man in front of her one bit?! Something must be wrong with him, right?!
After that day, Zhou Yingxue never appeared before Ren Xiaosu again. The frequency of him being watched also lessened. Sometimes, they would only keep watch on him once every few days.
Meanwhile, An Yuqian’s lectures were starting to progress much quicker. He even sighed, saying how he had never thought it would be this easy to teach students. When he used to teach, he always felt the students were really stupid.
Ren Xiaosu realized An Yuqian could have been in research in the past. Later, he somehow became a librarian. When he had time, he thought that maybe he could ask Yang Xiaojin about it. She might just know something regarding this.
As they learned more, Wang Yuchi and the other male students would occasionally sketch the armor’s blueprint from imagination during their breaks. Now that the delay in their control of the nanomachines had been reduced to less than 0.2 seconds, they would sometimes imagine how they would look with the armor on. It was really exciting just thinking about it.
After they sketched out the designs for the arms and hands, An Yuqian caught a glimpse and said with a laugh, “So you’d wanted to design something like that? Y’know, it’s completely unachievable!”
Ren Xiaosu looked up at An Yuqian. “Why?”
An Yuqian replied, “A lot of people are looking to design ‘mechanical armor’ and think that these individual combat systems can play a significant role on the battlefield. However, there’s too many challenges to overcome.”
Ren Xiaosu asked with great interest, “What kinds of challenges?”
“First of all, you can’t solve the issue of the propulsion system.” An Yuqian sneered, “How could there be such a powerful and portable power source in this world? There’s only one kind of power source like this, and it’s achieved through controlled nuclear fusion!”
Ren Xiaosu was stunned. Yang Xiaojin was from the Saboteurs, an organization that hated nuclear technology the most. If he were to fit a controlled fusion reactor on his armor, wouldn’t all of the Saboteurs come after him?
“Are there any other potential power sources?” Ren Xiaosu asked.
An Yuqian said firmly, “No! At least not within the limits of known technology! The raw materials for fusion are deuterium and tritium. If the technology is advanced enough, just deuterium alone can be used. An abundant amount of deuterium already exists in water. But the existing methods of controlled fusion, such as the ‘tokamak,’[1] present a very difficult problem to solve. The question remains on how to shrink the size of the device so it can be fitted easily on a human body. The larger the visible radius of the device, the better the energy confinement!”
“It’s not impossible if you want to shrink it, but it will be difficult.” An Yuqian looked at Ren Xiaosu and the others with a smile. “It’s just a dream for the several of you to achieve it.”
Ren Xiaosu frowned. He had also been struggling with the power source for the nanomachines all this while. After all, if he only depended on his bioenergy to charge them, he would only be able to use it for two minutes with every two hours of charging. It would not be enough to sustain the nanomachines in a high-intensity battle.
“Are there any other challenges that can’t be overcome?” Ren Xiaosu asked.
An Yuqian said, “How would you command the full body of armor to listen to your orders? How complicated a procedure would it take in order to—”
“That seems rather easy to solve,” interrupted Ren Xiaosu.
An Yuqian was confused. ‘What are you bragging for?!’
However, Ren Xiaosu did not intend to say any more than that. Be it the Yang Consortium or the Li Consortium, no one would possibly use the nanomachines as armor for now. That was mainly because it would be a little too extravagant to use them like that.
[1] A tokamak is a device which uses a powerful magnetic field to confine a hot plasma in the shape of a torus. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tokamak | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawson_criterion | http://juser.fz-juelich.de/record/283636/files/Koslowski_EI-3.pdf