Chapter 1 Auro the Scholar

Auro the scholar stood up shakily—onlookers worried the old man might suddenly keel over mid-sentence—he took a few breaths before slowly describing the castle’s situation: “The electricity spirits have just returned and are very weak. We’ve lost over half our lights, and the heaters and some of the water supply have stopped working. The technical apprentices have found some burnt-out lines; they’re replacing the parts, but we don’t have enough spares…”

“Prioritize fixing the heaters. We can haul water from the nearby Water Trough Town; their reserves can supply us for at least half a month,” the castle governor interrupted the scholar. “Any news from Metal Town?”

“We can’t see their lights from here; their power probably hasn’t been restored. The communicators are also down,” another short, stout man sitting beside the scholar stood up. “Looks like we need to send someone over.”

“Then send someone. You’ll lead the team. Take several people with you, and be careful of the barbarians from Iron Citadel seizing the opportunity to plunder our galvanized sheets and wires.”

“Winter is coming,” Auro the scholar had more to say. “My lord, this darkness should be a warning. The firewood we offered won’t stop this winter. We should consider what to do when winter truly arrives. We must gather refugees, stockpile more supplies, and send an envoy to Iron Citadel…”

“Scholar, you’re just an expert on machines and light bulbs. I decide about war,” the castle governor rapped the table. “I don’t care if this winter you speak of comes or not; there will never be true peace between us and Iron Citadel, at least not if I have to initiate a truce with those treacherous barbarians.”

The scholar mumbled, but the old man ultimately didn’t intend to challenge the governor’s authority on the spot. After a heavy sigh, he sat back down.

The castle governor held a decisive meeting and arranged all subsequent matters, then urged Auro the scholar and his escort to depart as soon as possible. He did ask Hao Ren and the other “guest generals” for their opinions, but Hao Ren also wanted to leave as soon as possible—so after the old scholar made some simple preparations, the group prepared to leave Hearthstone Castle.

Hao Ren and the others waited for Willie at the small road leading to Hearthstone Castle. Lily craned her neck, looking towards the “Ancestral Hearth” on the horizon, a little worried: “We’re not walking, are we? We have to take an eighty-year-old geezer with us. Walking these dozens of kilometers will probably make the reactor blow again…”

Hao Ren was also pondering this. It would be quick for his group of superhumans to run over there, but taking Willie and Auro was another matter. Willie had seen “witchcraft,” so using some high technology to take him there was still possible, like the high-tech Beidou Star in his dimensional pocket. But what about Auro the scholar? The old man’s eighty-year-old heart might not be able to handle the Beidou Star’s surging speed…

But his inner turmoil didn’t last long before being interrupted by a “putt-putt-putt” sound coming from behind him. He heard a sound like a tractor approaching, and when he turned around, he saw a magical vehicle belching black smoke as it drove out of Hearthstone Castle…

The vehicle’s rear half was a square carriage pieced together from sheet metal and planks, while the front was hitched to a completely mismatched engine. The engine was entirely exposed, with two crooked exhaust pipes extending from both sides, puffing out black smoke on either side of the front. The driver’s seat of this vehicle was also quite magical: there was a dark wooden chair, fixed to the back of the engine with wire and rope, completely exposed. The steering wheel in front of the chair was a curved handle that had been taken from somewhere; not only was it bent, but it was also asymmetrical…

But the most magical scene was the person sitting in the chair: Auro the scholar was sitting there, the gaunt, aged, and frail old scholar sitting bolt upright, his face serious as he gripped the steering wheel, a fistful of hair around his head fluttering slightly in the wind, like an old knight inspecting the battlefield.

Lily was stunned by this scene: “Awoo?”

Accompanied by billowing black smoke and a deafening putt-putt sound, the cobbled-together sheet metal tractor finally screeched to a halt in front of Hao Ren. Willie poked his head out from the back of the carriage, the young man now looking quite energetic: “Sorry to keep you waiting! Let’s go, everyone, get in the vehicle.”

Hao Ren pointed at this “vehicle,” his stomach full of things to complain about, unsure where to start. He wondered if he should complain that in this world regressed to a feudal monarchy there were still people who could drive, or if he should complain that there were tractors built with wooden planks and wires—this magical vehicle was like a work of performance art, standing tall at the crotch of classic and modern, its presence leaving people speechless.

“Surprised, aren’t you?” Auro the scholar saw Hao Ren’s expression in the rearview mirror. The old man smiled smugly. “Only scholars who have studied at the Tower of Knowledge for more than six years are qualified and learn how to drive these steel beast war chariots, and there are only three such vehicles in all of Hearthstone Castle. If it weren’t for His Majesty the King’s urgent summons, the governor wouldn’t have let it out. Enough talk, get in!”

Hao Ren forcefully swallowed all the words in his stomach and dragged Lily into the carriage. After getting in, he discovered that there were no formal seats in the carriage—because the entire carriage was just a wooden box tied together with wire. The locals didn’t know how to make car seats, nor did they know how to fix these seats to the car’s chassis. Willie pulled out a few folding stools from the back of the carriage and pushed them in front of Hao Ren and the others: “Please, have a seat.”

Auro the scholar in front confirmed that everyone was in the vehicle, told everyone to sit tight, then straightened his scholar’s robe, sat astride the wooden chair, stepped on the gas, and started the car.

Lily glanced at the folding stool Willie had pushed over: “When I entered the city in a boxcar decades ago, it was also a small stool… Ei, momma, woof!”

It turned out that the old scholar had floored the gas pedal, and this composite tractor shot onto the pitted road. The violent bumps immediately made Lily face-plant in front of Hao Ren. Hao Ren hurriedly helped the girl up, then saw that the others in the carriage were also bumping and shaking violently. It proved that installing any kind of seat in this car was meaningless, because after the car started, the entire carriage was practically in Brownian motion. Passengers needed to be highly skilled to fix themselves in one position. On the surface, it looked like everyone was sitting on chairs, but in reality, everyone was squatting in a horse stance to keep up with the carriage’s synchronous vibrations…

Willie, this seemingly useless and timid soldier, seemed very calm at this time. As a local, he was used to the shaking…

“Can this car really drive?” Hao Ren squatted in a horse stance and shouted to Willie, “Is there even a road outside?”

He remembered the terrible road conditions he had seen when coming from the Fertile Road. The once-smooth Sanctuary Avenue had long been as broken as the Gobi Desert. He seriously doubted how far this cobbled-together work of art under his butt could go after hitting the road. Experiencing the degree of vibration of the carriage, he even felt that the lateral mileage of this car was the same as the longitudinal mileage…

Willie shouted back: “It’s okay! The main road is often maintained!”

Hao Ren stuck his head out and took a look. As expected, he saw that the car was driving onto a wider and better road. Although the concrete surface of this road was also cracked and broken, all the potholes had signs of being filled in, which reassured him a little.

But after Auro the scholar stepped on the accelerator and roared the car onto the avenue, he realized: the road conditions were useless.

The car conditions were the real problem. This car had no shock absorbers at all! Its four wheels weren’t even necessarily all round—no wonder a high-IQ scholar had to study at that whatever tower for six years to learn how to drive a tractor, because this wasn’t a driving course, it was an extreme sports course!

Hao Ren was both vibrating in sync with the carriage and worrying that the various parts of the car would fall off while driving, and at the same time looking through the front window of the carriage at Auro the scholar sitting on the engine outside. The old man was sitting in a backrest chair tied to the engine with wire and rope, his robes and hair fluttering in the wind. He was especially worried that the old man might fall off the chair if he didn’t sit still…

“My impression of this scholar has been subverted,” Nangong Sanba said to his sister, “People sixty years younger than him on Earth wouldn’t dare to do this.”

Hao Ren was both vibrating in sync with the car and muttering in his heart: Even if this car was thrown on Earth, let alone whether anyone would dare to drive it, whether you could even recognize it was still a question. If you threw this thing on the road, no one would know what it was doing if you didn’t turn it on…