The Real Daughter Just Wants to Pilot Mechas - Chapter 82

Over the weekend, Jiang Momo stayed in the control room with Qin Chu to work on modifying the simulation battle system data. Of course, it was Jiang Momo who proposed the ideas while Qin Chu implemented them.

By the end, Qin Chu was almost in a daze. She felt like she’d lost her mind. She was actually starting to enjoy the simulation battle setup and even had a strange urge to play it herself.

Finally, just before midnight on Sunday, Jiang Momo’s voice rang like a celestial melody in Qin Chu’s ears.

“Alright, the solo simulation battle mode is done for now. It can go into use.”

“Okay,” Qin Chu answered in a daze, then suddenly remembered the protocol, and said, “We can’t release it just yet. It needs approval from the higher-ups.”

Normally, anything she built would need sign-off from five different leaders. But since the director gave her the task, his approval alone should be enough.

Qin Chu packaged the entire system and sent it to the director with a brief written report on their work.

The director was still working overtime. After glancing at her report, he signed it immediately.

Come on, even if he didn’t believe the two of them could make something earth-shattering, he couldn’t ignore Major General Lu’s involvement. Even if it turned out to be garbage, he’d still have to present it. As for how it was presented, that was his call.

Jiang Momo had seen Qin Chu preparing the report and was getting ready to pack up and head home when Qin Chu suddenly lit up.

“The director said the system’s creators will be credited as us!” Qin Chu turned to Jiang Momo in disbelief, beaming with excitement.

“What’s the point of being credited?” Jiang Momo asked.

Qin Chu cheerfully explained, “Generally speaking, when we create something as members of the unit, the intellectual property belongs to the unit and is only credited to the unit’s name. But now the unit notified us that it’ll be under both our names. That means the rights belong to us. Even though it’s unlikely, if we ever get the chance to sell it, the money will go to us.”

That possibility isn’t just unlikely. It’s impossible. The Military Research Institute’s inventions, aside from those eliminated and handed down to academies, never appear outside. Most of her happiness came from seeing her name next to her idol’s!

Now, let her carefully study where exactly to sign that name!

Jiang Momo’s eyes lit up. “You have a way to sell this thing?”

“Nope!” Qin Chu answered immediately without even looking up.

“Oh.” Jiang Momo’s excitement instantly vanished. “Then let’s just release it. There should still be people training right now.”

***

There definitely were people training at that moment and Zhou Li was one of the unlucky souls.

Originally, his squad had a full rest day that day. Everyone was probably already asleep by now but because of insomnia, he came to the training grounds to practice in simulation battles.

He was doing fine at first. But after midnight, the moment he entered again, the entire scene changed.

The roughly 100-square-meter training ground had turned into a wasteland. Skyscrapers loomed in the distance and he hovered mid-air in the center of the ruins. From where he stood, he could see the alien beasts moving among the buildings, ramming into them as if trying to bring them down to devour the people inside.

“Did I just get transported?! Is this heaven’s punishment for my pathetic reaction to the alien beasts?” Zhou Li was in disbelief.

His family wasn’t well-off and he had only average abilities. On Friday, when Major General Lu suddenly picked him to join an alien beast eradication team, he thought it was thanks to all his time spent training in the simulation room. He assumed he was finally being recognized and about to soar up the ranks.

But the moment he saw the alien beasts in real life, his legs gave out. He was promptly demoted from the core team and reassigned to help evacuate civilians.

[Ding. Welcome to the new Alien Beast Combat Simulation Arena. Since this is your first entry, the rules will now be explained.

1. Due to site limitations, your activity range remains within 100 square meters. Please calculate your battle range carefully.

2. Each battle will have between 3 and 51 alien beasts, with a 50% chance of an alien beast king appearing.

3. The alien beasts’ strength will increase over time and with the deaths of virtual characters. Eliminate them as quickly as possible.

4. Minimum pain setting is 10%. Please choose your pain sensitivity now.]

“Pain setting? I’m not lying in a simulation pod right now. I’m using virtual projection in the training ground. Did the program get screwed up?” Zhou Li was baffled.

[Please select your pain sensitivity. This cannot be changed until you completely clear one run. Choose carefully. If you’re afraid of pain, we suggest 10%.]

“This AI is an idiot. Everyone knows virtual projection doesn’t come with pain settings!” Zhou Li said offhandedly, “I’m not afraid of pain. Set it to 100%, whatever!”

[Pain sensitivity confirmed: 100%. Good luck in battle.]

The mechanical voice disappeared.

Two leaderboards appeared in the upper right corner and Zhou Li glanced at them. They were empty for now but clearly, only the top ten would be shown.

What’s the point of this leaderboard?

Zhou Li was still staring at it when he noticed all the alien beasts around him had suddenly focused on him the moment the mechanical voice cut off. All eyes were locked on him.

While he was on guard against the ones approaching from the front, thinking it was just a flashier format with the same difficulty, an alien beast suddenly pounced on him from behind. One swipe of its claw pierced the cockpit.

“AHHHHHHHHHH!!!”

[Battle ended. We look forward to your next performance. Producers: Jiang Momo, Qin Chu.]

***

Qin Chu and Jiang Momo looked at the data of participants from the control system panel and shook their heads silently.

“What’s up with these people? How come none of them lasted even two minutes? Wait, why are they all setting such high pain levels?” Qin Chu clicked her tongue. “God, someone even chose 100% pain sensitivity? Is he fearless?!”

Jiang Momo had also noticed that person, as he was the first to die out of everyone. “Wait, isn’t the simulation battle using projection in the training field? How is there pain?”

“Because the mechas used in simulation training are specially designed to interact with projections. The original designers installed electric shock devices inside the cockpits to simulate pain from battle injuries. But before this, the researchers thought it was inhumane, so it was never used,” Qin Chu explained casually, having only recently figured it out while building the system.

After speaking, she hesitated a bit. “The pain might be too realistic. Will it hurt morale?”

“It might but if they can’t handle pain in training, they could lose the ability to fight if wounded in actual battle,” Jiang Momo replied.

There was another reason. Pain triggers adrenaline, which might actually boost combat performance. But she figured that argument might sound too inhumane to the Federation, so she didn’t say it.

“Good point!” Qin Chu nodded repeatedly, tapped the top-right of the screen, and changed the data into small individual displays.

Each mecha was shown in a different setting. According to the original design, the scene for each entrant was randomized.

What surprised Qin Chu was that the number of participants in the next round was the same as last time, meaning no one quit because of pain, not even the poor guy who chose 100%. In fact, by the time some had reached their third or fourth round, more people had joined.

“They really think this almost instant-death mode is fun?” Qin Chu was in disbelief.

She thought she was just sleep-deprived and hallucinating. Were there really people enjoying this?

Jiang Momo crossed her arms and calmly replied, “Not necessarily. Let’s see what happens after this round.”

Sure enough, once newcomers arrived, the veterans who had gritted their teeth through two or three rounds logged off and disappeared.

“What’s going on now?” Qin Chu looked at Jiang Momo expectantly.

“If you were doing normal training and suddenly the difficulty spiked, where you’d accidentally set the pain too high and you had no way to fight back, it’s just pure torture, while you had comrades watching your every move, would you warn them? Or would you lure them into suffering with you?” Jiang Momo asked.

Qin Chu thought for a moment. “Logically, I should warn them.”

But with the leaderboard now in play, it was different. Maybe she was just being petty but she didn’t want others to rank higher just because she warned them.

And honestly, she must be crazy, but it actually felt kind of fun to drag her friends in to suffer with her!

“Mhm.” Jiang Momo nodded. “Exactly what you’re thinking.”

“If that’s the case, this is kind of big,” Qin Chu mused. “There must be some altruistic people who’ll give warnings but before the truth spreads, many might choose to ‘trick’ others into joining. That means our system might hit peak usage tonight!”

Jiang Momo neither confirmed nor denied it.

But Qin Chu was clearly right. From the tenth minute on, user numbers began climbing exponentially every minute. Every member stationed in Zone A1 was pulled into the training grounds by some method before sunrise. Of course, some people tried to explain, but by then it was too late. No one could tell what was true or false anymore.

That night, Zone A1’s simulation training reached its highest participation in history.

When the department head came to the office the next morning and saw Qin Chu with two massive eye bags offering the data like a treasure, he was completely stunned.

He looked at Qin Chu and then at the data, at a loss for words. He immediately forwarded the report to Lu Feng.

Lu Feng hadn’t expected to hear from the office director so early. Thinking maybe Jiang Momo had messed something up, he quickly opened the message, only for his pupils to dilate in shock at what he saw.

“Did these people take a stimulant last night? No, how can their performance result be this low?! I guess it’s time to ramp up training!”

***

Jiang Momo had no idea what cruel training the Zone A1 soldiers would suffer during the day. She was only puzzled why her class on Introduction to Mecha Manufacturing was once again empty.

Surely the Third Military District hadn’t dragged away all her students to train again?!

In the classroom, the only two students present were Yan Chang and E Mingjun, sitting upright in the front row. Yan Chang looked like a model student with a notebook in hand, ready to take notes. E Mingjun, however, seemed dazed and completely out of it.

As Jiang Momo prepared her teaching materials, she secretly observed E Mingjun’s expression.

Ever since she’d arrived early and told them in full detail what happened during the study tour, Yan Chang had patted his chest and promised her a perfect solution. From that moment on, E Mingjun had looked like that.