mtlumby2d Chapter 3 Defective Products
Chapter 3 Defective Products
After finishing his meal, Yin Vector sighed contentedly, feeling as if he were dizzy from carbon monoxide poisoning, and became a little lazy.
Knowing she couldn't escape, she let the other person carry her away again.
Along the way, some people recognized Zhen Tianzun's name and asked him for autographs or went up to greet and chat with him.
She watched silently, and when there were fewer people around a corner, she said, "You're quite famous."
"Is there a problem?"
"No. Is it because of your winning streak? How many games have you won? How long has it lasted?" She recalled the commentator's assessment of him as a dark horse during their previous encounter at the arena.
Zhen Tianzun finally looked down at her, and the area he led her into became quieter and quieter, with fewer people around. He pulled her to a metal house that didn't look very big but was indeed a detached building, and then dragged her inside. The metal door slammed shut behind them.
"Forty-eight matches. A nineteen-month cycle. What, you want to sign up again?" He didn't mention those matches that he didn't even consider gladiatorial combat, like today's one.
Yin Vector shook his head, a new understanding of the other party's strength forming in his mind.
After he threw her onto the seat, she shifted her position to find a comfortable one in the oversized metal chair.
Zhen Tianzun sat down opposite her, crossed his legs, crossed his arms, and looked down at her.
"You are a defective product."
Yin Xiang blinked, thought for a moment, and guessed that he might have seen her wrist, so she simply nodded: "Yes. What's wrong?"
Zhen Tianzun raised one eyebrow, looking at her with a mixture of amusement and a sense of dread, as if he were observing a young life.
Do you know what a defective product is?
"A product with slightly incorrect factory settings?" Vector answered based on his understanding, then added after a moment's thought, "What's your definition of it?"
Zhen Tianzun looked at her, leaned slightly forward against the metal table, and stared at her through his pale blue optical glasses. He said, word by word, "The spark has a fundamental problem. It cannot have its own consciousness or basic mobility. It is a piece of junk made of inferior metal and incomplete modules."
After digesting the definition for a while, focusing on the label "unable to have self-awareness and the ability to act," she almost instantly understood why the other party had stopped fighting in the arena, why they had brought her here, and why, even though she looked like an old, broken metal machine about to rust, the other party was still willing to feed her first.
She was an abnormal individual, and if discovered, she would likely be dealt with and ostracized as a heretic. This guy called Zhen Tianzun was clearly very interested in her abnormal state.
She quickly asked, "But you sent me back. Are you trying to study me?" She paused, then added, "What is a spark?"
Zhen Tianzun looked at her without any expression, as if he had guessed that she would ask this question.
"Research? Maybe. That depends on how you interpret it." Zhen Tianzun sneered, his voice like a deep, metallic scraping sound. Yin Xiang glanced at the other's neck armor—was this guy a deep bass?
The Celestial Being noticed her gaze but said nothing, continuing, "The fire is the very lifeblood of us Cybertronians."
He said it casually, as if stating a basic common sense fact.
"Without a spark, the machine is just a metal shell. Energy fluid can keep it running, parts can be replaced, and modules can be repaired, but if the spark goes out, that individual is truly dead."
He looked at her and pointed at her with one finger.
"You live by the spark of life."
Subconsciously, Yin Xiang glanced down at her chest. Beneath the barrier, the bluish-green energy core lay quietly. What she had previously defined as her heart now had a formal name—the Spark.
Zhen Tianzun clearly noticed her movement, and his gaze followed her down.
"That thing in your chest is the spark. It's the root that gives a Cybertronian consciousness, will, and emotions."
The vector was taken aback. "So, in theory, defective products shouldn't be like mine?"
"It shouldn't be like that." Zhen Tianzun answered decisively, his pale blue optical lens revealing no hesitation. "Defective sparks are fundamentally flawed from the moment they are formed. They cannot go online, cannot develop consciousness, and are insufficient to drive autonomous action."
He leaned forward slightly again, pressing his body against her like a wall. The way he stared at her was as if he were observing something that shouldn't be there.
"And you can speak, think, ask questions, and even beg for mercy while clinging to my leg in the arena."
Pointer vector: "..."
Do we really have to bring this up again?
"Therefore you should not exist."
Zhen Tianzun concluded.
The vector actually understood what he meant. After all, to put it in perspective, it was like a stillborn baby coming back to life and clinging to his leg in the arena, begging for mercy.
She hesitated for a few seconds before saying, "But I am indeed alive, and my consciousness is fine."
She stared at the man, who was as big as a small mountain, and said, "If you want to study this, that's fine, but you have to teach me some common sense."
She was acutely aware of her lack of understanding of the world and the problems and unfriendly stares that her abnormality might cause.
However, she could also sense that even if this machine was interested in her and wanted to study her, it at least didn't intend to use extreme methods to study her: it didn't crush her into a scrap metal plate in the arena.
"Also, how can I remove this scratch? If I remove it, will other machines not be able to tell that I'm a defective product?" She raised the inside of her left wrist.
Perhaps not expecting her to agree so readily, and even asking a lot of questions, a hint of surprise flashed in Zhen Tianzun's optical glasses, and then he reached out and grabbed her wrist.
The other party exerted force with their fingertips, ignoring the pain that the vector was screaming in agony, and directly used brute force to flatten those engraved characters.
"Okay, I can teach you common sense, but you'd better not be too obviously stupid. I don't have that much patience."
Zhen Tianzun slowly withdrew his hand, looking at the vivid and varied expressions on the other party's face, and snorted, "Your mask is quite flexible."
The moment the other person withdrew their hand, she pulled her own hand back, rubbing the inside of her left wrist back and forth with her right hand. A habit she retained from her human days made her blow on it, even though she realized the next second that it was useless.
"I understand, I understand...it hurts so much." After rubbing it for a while and feeling the pain subside, she looked at the other person and said, "Is there anything else you want to ask?"
"When did you log in? Where are you located? What modules did you install?"
Zhen Tianzun ignored her complaints and asked directly.
"Yesterday, I think? I'm not sure, but it shouldn't have been long. I woke up in the junkyard, followed the light here, and then met you in the arena. Also, what do you mean by 'module'?"
Yin Xiang lowered his wrist, which was finally no longer in pain, and leaned back slightly in his chair to distance himself from this strong and somewhat unreasonable guy.
"So what can you do?" Zhen Tianzun thought for a moment and didn't press her further. After all, she was a defective product, and it was highly likely that even the most basic modules would have problems or be missing altogether.
He then changed his approach and asked, "Do you have a combat module? A trading system? Internal communication?"
Vector was bewildered by this string of words and shook his head: "I don't know what these are, nor how to check them. Maybe I have them but haven't activated them?"
"No, if you don't know, then it's most likely that it wasn't installed." Zhen Tianzun denied, leaning back slightly, his optical glasses fixed on her without moving away. "Never mind, you're probably missing quite a few things."
He stood up.
Subconsciously, Yin Vector looked up and stood up as the other person did, only to realize that when he stood up straight, his head barely reached the other person's waist.
How did this guy grow up to look like this? Yin Vector tilted his head and looked him over.
Zhen Tianzun was also looking down at her.
She was clearly a lightweight machine, much thinner than a typical Cybertronian. Her joints and outer armor showed signs of repair and damage, and some parts even showed signs of underdevelopment.
It has a pair of small sensor fins on both sides of its head, and two pairs of mechanical fins of different lengths folded up on its back, like some kind of flow guide structure that has not yet been fully formed.
The color scheme is dark, with deep purple and dark blue dominating the entire machine.
The only thing that stood out was the pair of cyan-blue optical lenses, which were excessively bright and so vibrant that they didn't look like defective products.
Zhen Tianzun picked her up again and took her directly to an empty room next door.
He then went into the adjacent storage room where miscellaneous items were piled up, casually pulled out a single charging bed and a small table, and arranged them in the room in a few quick movements, as if they were some temporary parts.
"You'll stay here from now on. I'll teach you common sense as I remember it." He turned to look at her. "You should at least know how to use the charging bed, right?"
"No," the vector said decisively.
Zhen Tianzun stared at her for two seconds, as if reassessing what he had actually picked up.
"...Okay. Come and learn."