Reboot: Mechanic

Despite being overly suspicious of how Shi Tian managed to acquire such a blueprint or create it, Mary decided to brush it aside for now.

The blueprint was truly detailed and after reading it thoroughly, she could discern that it was indeed a high possibility of being able to replicate the rigged IC chip.

"Do you have the silicon materials, resistor, and other components ready?" Mary asked, seemingly ready to craft it. 

Shi Tian nodded his head. 

"All of the required components are placed by the container on your left side." He said, pointing at the container.

Given that all of the replacement components were common, he was able to scavenge them within the Iron Sentinel. 

Of course, the complication of crafting it required more materials than the original, given that everything was replaced to replicate the original function.

To make it simpler to understand, the current development was like a math equation. 

When you could easily get the number 15 by adding 10 and 5, they now have to get to that number by adding 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 to get the number 15. 

The result was the same, but the latter part required more unnecessary numbers. And this was Mary and Shi Tian's current situation in which they are forced to do the latter part. 

"This is going to take me at least 3-5 hours, depending on the complication." Mary scratched her head and said exhaustedly. 

It had been a long time since she crafted something from scratch. And to be fair, she hated sitting down for a long duration of time. She would rather fight others than sit down as if she were a prisoner. 

Shi Tian nodded his head, not finding it surprising that it would take her a while to craft the IC chip.

"Nathan, while I start building it, do you mind getting the programmer to start up in the control panel. Since you have given me the blueprint, you should understand the gist of the code needed to be loaded into the IC chip once I finished crafting, right?" Mary asked, literally testing him on his knowledge. 

Unfortunately for her though, Shi Tian might not be capable of crafting the IC chip, but he does have some of the knowledge of the coding required to load into it.

"Sure, no problem." He gave her an 'okay' sign and went to the control panel.

With that said, the two of them remained in the Iron Sentinel, working hard on the replication of the rigged IC chip.

Meanwhile, Theobold gradually started taking control of the situation again. 

At the same time, he ordered a few elite soldiers to investigate how the evolved Gilaso variant managed to sneak up on that, avoiding all of the surveillance. 

In addition, Theobold created a small team consisting of soldiers adept in agility to check how the Gilaso variants managed to undergo another evolution.

"There must be something that we failed to spot…" Theobold muttered, his eyes glancing at the screen in the command center that was built for strategic planning. 

The command center had three people constantly monitoring the screen, and Theobold's eyes were inspecting each of the screens, seemingly trying to find an abnormality. 

Monsters don't just undergo evolution randomly. It required a lot of conditions, including but not limited to the terrain, atmosphere, and mutation. 

As Theobold was struggling to find a clue to anything, Vanessa suddenly entered the command center, much to his surprise.

"Why did you come here, Vanessa? It's too dangerous for you to move around." Theobold raised an eyebrow and warned. With variables unknown to him, Theobold could not afford to have Vanessa leave the extremely safe tent. 

"I'm not a flower vase, Commander Theobold." Vanessa rolled her eyes and scoffed. "And I'm here because I noticed something, so I thought about sharing it with you. But I guess you don't want to hear it since I'm such a vulnerable person." She added, ready to turn around and leave.

"Wait a minute, Vanessa. That is not what I meant." Theobold extended his hand and quickly retracted his previous statement. For her to come all the way here because she noticed something was amiss, Theobold was sure that she might have found a clue or something.

After all, an Esper was highly sensitive to the abnormality in the atmosphere, especially when Vanessa could manipulate the terrain with ease. 

Desperately trying to keep Vanessa here, Theobold almost lost all of his dignity as a military commander. 

It was only now that he subtly understood Shi Tian's mindset when he was so willing to kick Vanessa out of his apartment.

Vanessa was naturally not one to forgive so easily, at least toward others, she made a signal that she was tired. 

Without hesitation, Theobold snapped his fingers and one of the clever soldiers that was on the monitor heard the cue. The soldier quickly grabbed a chair and placed it next to Vanessa before returning to his position.

"Have a seat, Vanessa," Theobold said gently. "Is there anything else you need?" 

Crossing her legs, Vanessa thought about toying with him longer but considering the meticulous care he had given to her in the past days, she decided to let him off easy. 

"Anyway, my perception has been heightened since the appearance of the evolved Gilaso variants," Vanessa explained.

"Your perception has been heightened? Was it because of the threat it posed or the sudden appearance of it?" Theobold enquired. 

The evolved Gilaso variant's appearance was a rather unexpected encounter. Despite having numerous preparations made and many surveillance equipment placed on the site, they were still unable to detect its movement. 

Just these two factors alone had caused quite the headache for Theobold. 

After all, if the evolved Gilaso variant could still sneak up on them despite all the equipment, then what was preventing them from being able to sneak up to Gearits City and unleash havoc? 

However, Vanessa shook her head, shutting down those claims of Theobold.

"That's not it, Commander Theobold. What I meant is that I can feel an aura of strange energy shrouding the evolved Gilaso variant." Vanessa's tone was solemn, revealing a clue.