Volume 2: The Undersea City Chapter 41 Bartlett
"Is this true?!" Layton turned around and saw a tall, thin man with a pink afro. He was wearing a motorcycle jacket covered with rivets and nuts, and two old-fashioned mechanical arms extended from the short sleeves.
"Whether it's true or not, you can check it yourself and you'll know. It's not a secret." There was a hint of resentment in the pink afro's tone - Ke Lan glanced at his prosthesis, which was at least a 150-year-old model. Even the common standard parts had been discontinued for a long time. It was difficult to find these things even on the black market. No one knew how he completed daily maintenance.
Layton had already taken out a PAD from his pocket. He didn't care that his fingers were still stained with oil and started swiping on the screen.
But the more he stroked, the gloomier his expression became.
"...Fuck, the price of the Higman VI skeleton has increased by 50% compared to a month ago! Norma Technology's chips are more than twice as expensive! And Tamron Bio's biochemical filling fluid...what the hell is going on?!"
Layton's eyes swept across the lines of numbers. That was his upgrade budget. But according to the latest prices, he would have to pay at least twice as many credit points.
And...a lot of things are out of stock.
"According to gossip , new alien technology has been cracked at the research institute. Didn't you see the news a few days ago? According to those shitty experts, artificial prosthetics technology will leap to a whole new level within three years. Now all manufacturers are researching new technologies, and many existing old production lines will be converted into production lines for new equipment... But you also know that we definitely can't afford the new equipment. The supply of old equipment has begun to shrink, so the accessories of existing models have started to increase in price."
The girl with pink afro twisted her wrist, and the rusty metal parts immediately made a teeth-grinding friction sound.
"...Under normal circumstances, the price can't be so outrageous. There must be profiteers hoarding goods. Damn it!" Layton said indignantly. If it were before, he could just wait for a year or two until the equipment equipped with new technology came on the market, and the price of the old model would naturally fall. But the problem was that he couldn't wait now - he couldn't carry an external battery around all day, could he? And without the mechanical arm, Layton's own strength would be greatly reduced. Not to mention exploring the ruins, it would be difficult for him to even protect himself in the wilderness .
"What can we do? There are plenty of credits in their accounts." The pink afro sighed and said, "You look like ruins hunters, right?"
"Yeah." Ke Lan nodded. There was nothing to hide about this kind of thing. It could be found out with just a simple search.
"At least you guys have a decent income. For a worker like me, a few years of wages may not be enough to buy a new body..."
"Then you still have money to drink?" Ke Lan was speechless. On the table with the pink afro was a 150 ml bottle of "Roland Malt Craft Beer". Although beer was cheaper than liquor, the amount was more than what was in the glasses of Ke Lan and the other three combined.
"There's no hope for the future anyway, so I'll just live one day at a time." The girl with the pink afro shrugged nonchalantly, "Who knows if I'll suddenly die tomorrow? If I don't spend all the money in my pocket, won't I lose everything?"
"What about your family?" Ke Lan asked. On the Ark, people like him who were born in the training center were still a minority after all, and most people still maintained the traditional human family structure.
"I had a sister who saved money for ten years to have a genetic modification surgery. However, she was cheated by a shady biological company, the surgery failed, and she died." The man with the pink afro spoke in an extremely cold tone, as if the dead person was not his sister but just an unrelated stranger.
"Uh... We've been chatting for a long time, but I still don't know your name." Ke Lan quickly changed the subject.
"Bartlett, if you feel like calling me Lao Ba, that's fine." Bartlett glanced at the advertising wall in the distance. "It's getting late. We should go. We have to go out to sea early tomorrow morning."
"Go out to sea?" Ke Lan was stunned. For the people on the Ark, this word was indeed a little unfamiliar.
"Oh, I forgot to tell you, I'm a boatman... not a spaceship, but a boat that sails in the sea." Bartlett grabbed the bottle and drank it all in one gulp. "Now you know... hiccup... why I have to spend all my money today."
"...The sea you said you wanted to leave, wouldn't it be the Central Sea?" There are only two oceans on Alpha, and the naming method is also extremely simple and crude - the one located at the South Pole is called "Polar Sea" or "End Sea", and the other is called "Central Sea".
"What else? You can't sail in the polar sea."
As Bartlett said, it is impossible to navigate in the Arctic Ocean because the entire ocean is covered by an ice sheet that is more than ten meters thick, and even a nuclear-powered icebreaker would find it difficult to break it.
"Oh, by the way, there is also a team of hunters among the people who went out to sea this time. We found a relic under the sea of Messia, and they are going to explore this relic." Bartlett suddenly said.
"Hmm? What ruins? Can you tell me in detail?" Hearing the word "ruins", Ke Lan, Hound and Layton instantly became interested.
For hunters, in addition to the ability to make a living, the ability to collect and process intelligence is also very important, especially those related to the Alpha ruins. These things used to cost money to buy, and they might not be used after purchase.
"Boss!" The Hound snapped his fingers. "Give this guy some roasted leeks and put it on our account."
Bartlett immediately sat down, with a somewhat disgusting smile on his face: "Hey, can I have something else to drink?"
"First, tell me what kind of ruins that is."
"...Okay. Actually, I don't know much... but it must be first-hand information." Bartlett pretended to be mysterious, "It's a city..."
"City?" Ke Lan and the Hound looked at each other and saw a hint of surprise in each other's eyes.
Ruins of this city level must be super large ruins and their level is definitely not low.
"Yes, a city!" Bartlett licked his cracked lips and continued, "The city was supposed to be built on a small island in the middle of the sea, but for some reason, the island sank to the bottom of the sea, and the city on the island naturally became an underwater city..."
"How big is this city?" the Hound demanded.
"I don't know the exact size, but I remember that the last time we surveyed it, it took our ship a week to complete a circumference, and the distance must have been hundreds of nautical miles."
"It's a big one!" Leighton said excitedly.
"But there are a lot of sea beasts in that sea area. We encountered at least a dozen attacks , and several people died... As for the last group of hunters who went into the water, none of them came up alive... Considering that you are treating me to a meal, I advise you not to take this job." Bartlett said earnestly.
