Chapter 212 - 194: Custom Prosthetics for Rhino Armor

"The injector of the Scorpion Potion injected too much, fearing that the dose wouldn’t be sufficient,"

"It appears the overfitting on the injector’s body won’t just alter the mind, but will also permanently change the bones and muscles—"

"This is a pathological transformation, his limbs gradually transforming into that of a scorpion’s skeletal structure and solidified by the war armor."

"His skin will also be replaced by a chitinous exoskeleton, which, upon contact with skin and nerves, serves well as a connective layer between the war armor and the organism."

"This is almost a cyclic deterioration, the Scorpion Battle Suit will ultimately turn a human into...an actual scorpion, both physiologically and psychologically."

"Ultimately, more often than not, he will die."

In the lab, the analysis of the Scorpion Battle Suit had been completed.

The conclusion is that only the most insane of madmen would wear such equipment—or that the person wearing the battle suit was not doing so voluntarily.

This war armor indeed has tremendous combat power, especially that tail which is practically an armor-piercing bullet for close combat, but it also has a fatal flaw.

Swinging and striking create enormous stress, which the exoskeleton of the armor is designed to withstand.

But this exoskeleton must also be adapted to the nerves, and the method of adaptation used leads to morphological changes toward a scorpion...

If one has to become a scorpion to withstand the stress brought by the war armor...then is the equipment designed for the person, or is the person designed for the equipment?

The effects of the brain-machine interface on neural pathways, the chain reactions of the exoskeleton and transgenic pharmaceuticals, the flaws in the armor’s soft drive system—

All analysis was completed.

In the lab, everyone fell into silence.

Dr. Otto was particularly stunned—not just by Lille’s academic prowess, nor just for the miserable fate of the scorpion.

There was also a sense of melancholy for himself: Octopus Arm is a highly dangerous external prosthetic modification, and the scorpion is the best case study.

Even if Lille had solved the chip problem, and the human body could command these mechanical arms directly over AI...

The thought pattern of having four extra arms could still easily affect the human consciousness in unknown ways.

After all, even in the Cyberpunk World, such extensive prosthetic enhancements are rare.

Moreover, the flexibility of the Octopus Arm is too exaggerated. No human brain can properly handle the level of mechanical signaling, and Lille had already calculated for Otto using mature theories.

If compared across two worlds, the signal complexity of one Octopus Arm slightly exceeds that of an entire Centaur Mecha.

In the lab, it was quiet, with only the sound of Lille continuously typing on the keyboard.

Otto suddenly whispered to Conners, "How old is he? Which school?"

"Just turned 18, Midtown High School."

"Ah?"

After Lille finished typing, the blueprint on the screen switched to Dr. Otto’s designed neural interface, revealing the chip inside.

"The bottleneck lies here, in the hardware. I have a new design for a prosthetic control driver, which also pairs with a new chip architecture."

"This architecture can more efficiently handle the conversion between biological and electrical signals."

Normally, the foundation of information engineering is binary logic operations, but the code used by organisms, namely DNA, is quaternary, comprising four nucleobases.

Therefore, in the Cyberpunk World, chips used in implantable prosthetics have always been designed based on quaternary conversion.

Meanwhile, there are remarkable advances in the field of biological computing, using both protein chips and silicon chips, achieving human-machine interaction.

This can increase the efficiency of human-machine data conversion exponentially.

"Theoretically... it can allow the human brain to safely handle the data flow of one arm, though, of course, the additional limbs will still affect consciousness."

Otto looked at Conners, then at the design on the screen.

[Voltage stable]

[Current stable]

[Data channel stable.]

[Safety simulation results: Pass]

"...This is really...astonishing."

Conners, wearing a "that’s exactly the look" expression, couldn’t stop smiling beside him.

When Lille had first pulled out something from his pocket years ago, Conners had the same expression!

After Otto reviewed the design, he paced back and forth, recalculating in his mind several times, and finally concluded:

Four Octopus Arms might be unstable, but one Octopus Arm is definitely possible to stabilize!

Let’s make one Octopus Arm first!

"This chip looks very familiar—right! There indeed was a CPU this year that used a similar architecture, it seems—"

Upon hearing this, Lille knew it was the chip he had had manufactured.

So he said, "I designed it, still have some with me, although the effects are a bit worse than expected, that’s the best our current technology can achieve."

Otto leaned back slightly, then turned and walked quickly toward the storeroom: "Let’s get started now!

In the warehouse, there are still a batch of synthetic materials, those are mine, Osborne Group can’t take them—

We’re going to realize this design now!"

The machines started up again—

His stunning inventions, especially the mechanical arms, make one forget that he is an authority and expert in multiple fields.

Especially in materials science, the dream-like performance of the Octopus Arm is based on his personal development of nanomaterials.

But in Lille’s eyes, it might as well be that every notable person in the Marvel Universe is an expert in materials science...

"Of course, I can..."

Drip...

[ctOS Emergency Broadcast:]

[A massive biological weapon has appeared outside New York University Hospital:]

[Image]

Lilton stopped in his tracks, accessing the TV broadcast signal, "Doctor, we have trouble. Take a look at this first."

The TV continuously flashed scenes from the streets:

A huge rhino-like war armor was racing down the street, flattening the road and everything in its path like a tank!

Thick black smoke billowed from it, and its exaggerated power easily smashed through buildings!

This was a bionic tank!

A group of men in suits wearing watercolor ink masks kept shooting, even brought out RPGs, but couldn’t penetrate the armor’s surface!

Gwen kept trying to divert the rhino’s direction, but couldn’t manage it—

The armor might not have been agile, but it was just too heavy!

[Gwen: The whole of New York is in chaos!]

[Gwen: That rhino charged from two streets away, and I don’t know where these masked people sprung from, but weapons are useless!]

[Gwen: Can’t breach the armor, can’t find an excuse with the USB drive—think of something quick!]

Everyone was stunned, and Lille quickly said, "We must stop that thing, think of a way to penetrate the rhino’s shell."

"But how?"

Lille entered another set of data.

In the Cyberpunk World, deep diving hacking was actually done by using the Jing Yuan-Grab transformation algorithm, visualizing circuit information to allow hackers to manipulate the current and voltage in circuits with more familiar logical thinking directly.

The USB drive used by Gwen was based on this idea, hence it could directly cut into the wiring for hacking.

But those USB drives can handle simple software programs; if the organization monitoring the NYPD and Norman got together, hacking in again might not be so simple.

He would have to take action himself.

"This is a direct hacking device, but now I need a weapon that can penetrate that huge armor."

Dr. Otto immediately thought of something: the tail of the Scorpion Battle Suit.

When the tail performed a linear penetration, it was actually launched, involving a highly complex mechanical structure.

But it wasn’t unreplicable.

Lille called up the design of the Scorpion’s tail construction, confirming both had the same thing in mind.

"I can replicate the armor-piercing construction of the Scorpion’s tail, but the material used in its tail section... looks like it’s confidential military-grade material."

"Luckily, I kept that stuff," he continued.

Lille pointed at a pile of parts on the table which included the armor-piercing tip of the Scorpion’s tail.

The thing even had a narrow tube built-in for transmitting biochemical venom, perfect for inserting into the circuit.

Dr. Otto tapped at the computer, hastily completed the calculations, and then crudely sketched out a diagram.

After the sketch was completed, yet another problem arose:

Force is mutual, they could create an armor-piercing tip and a propulsion system, but expecting to penetrate the rhino armor in one strike might be a bit idealistic.

So, how about the force rebounding onto the user during the collision?

An exoskeleton was needed in the design.

Dr. Otto looked at his own octopus arms...

This was his specialty, but according to their theoretical estimate, even if the octopus arms’ structure was simplified several times, the risk of installing an external prosthetic was still very high.

Moreover, this was for combat, where the internal state of the body could change drastically. Who could guarantee that the prosthetic system would still operate normally?

He hesitantly said, "... but in that case, the physical impact might be blocked, the mental impact..."

"I’ll bear it."

Lille spoke up, and Otto was once again deeply impressed. He couldn’t help but want to ask: why?

Why risk being changed by a machine, being corrupted by a machine to do this?

But there was no time to explain now, as Conners patted Otto on the shoulder.

"This young man is full of mysteries, but everyone has their secrets. Are you going to work or not, old friend?"

"... then let’s get started."

"What should I do?" Peter, who hadn’t spoken for a long time, raised his hand.

"Handle the wiring, watch the ammeter... report any issues."

Before getting started, Lille took off his clothes. "Gentlemen, I need to show you some things... not suitable for public disclosure."

This external prosthetic must match the prosthetic system on Lille’s body.

Either way, his neural interface on his body would be exposed.

"You all are trustworthy people—so please forget what you see here, once you leave this room."

He took off his clothes.

The three gaped in astonishment.