"Ying ying ying!"
Although Chen Luo couldn't understand what Xiao Ba was saying, he knew she was challenging the Herrscher of Sentience because, when the Herrscher of Sentience had pounced on Chen Luo earlier, she had initially succeeded, but later, when she got off Chen Luo, she had landed on Xiao Ba.
At that moment, Xiao Ba had let out a piercing cry.
Then, the Herrscher of Sentience and Xiao Ba had almost started fighting.
"Give me Book of Fuxi. I'll fix it," Chen Luo said, reaching out to the Herrscher of Sentience.
"Oh." The Herrscher of Sentience placed a spherical object in Chen Luo's hand and then continued her staring contest with the little fox.
"Sigh..." Watching the Herrscher of Sentience and the little fox staring each other down, Chen Luo sighed but decided not to intervene further.
Pet matters should be left to the pets themselves to resolve.
"Hmm, this thing..." After obtaining Book of Fuxi, Chen Luo retreated to a corner and began examining it intently.
When the ELF Book of Fuxi is out of power, it's a sphere.
When fully charged, you get a little ancestor.
As for what to use for charging, it still relies on Honkai Crystals.
Because the only energy source suitable for the Honkai world that Chen Luo has on hand is Honkai Crystals.
And after Chen Luo grasped Book of Fuxi, he automatically attained mastery of the [Book of Fuxi User Manual Compendium].
Generally speaking... this Book of Fuxi really does seem to be a piece of furniture.
Chen Luo suspected he might not even need the subconscious modifications the Herrscher of Sentience had made for him; he genuinely felt that Book of Fuxi was indeed a piece of furniture.
Book of Fuxi is equipped with a Honkai detector, GPS, a firepower system, and software like "The King of Jokes" and "A Complete Collection of Stories." It is a non-combat type ELF created by Fuxi and Nuwa so that after their passing, someone could accompany Fu Hua and help her maintain a warm and kind heart.
So, it's a non-combat type ELF, meaning it's furniture.
Perhaps it can be understood as a talking storybook.
"Speaking of which, I'm really quite interested in the jokes and stories from the Previous Era." Chen Luo fiddled with the sphere in one hand while modifying a Honkai Crystal with the other.
After essentially obtaining the user manual for Book of Fuxi, Chen Luo also understood the predicament it was currently in.
Book of Fuxi has been powered off for over a thousand years. It's like a computer; if you run it for a long time, it might overheat, but the chance of it breaking isn't high.
If you want to break a high-performance computer, just don't turn it on at all, let it gather dust for a few years, and you'll be amazed to find that the computer, which was previously unbreakable no matter how much you used it, has broken.
Of course, it's only a possibility.
But if, under these circumstances where damage is possible, you rashly power it on and connect it to a power source, the probability of it breaking reaches 80%.
Turning it on without cleaning the dust? I salute you as a warrior.
What Chen Luo was doing now was dusting off Book of Fuxi and warming it up.
And you know what? If anyone other than Chen Luo tried to repair or replace the battery of this Book of Fuxi, unless it was Fuxi and Nuwa, the creators themselves, they would likely damage some function of Book of Fuxi.
It might even wipe its memory.
Because this thing has been powered off for far too long.
ELFs aren't afraid of long-term use. Look at Klein, used for tens of thousands of years, still normally working overtime and pulling all-nighters, and after tens of thousands of years, still hasn't died from overwork.
So, why didn't Fuxi and Nuwa teach Fu Hua how to use it before entrusting Book of Fuxi to her? They could have at least taught her how to replace the battery or how to charge it.
Then again, it's possible Fu Hua simply couldn't learn it.
It's like mathematics; if you don't get it, you just don't get it.
It's not something you can necessarily learn no matter how many years you study.
While performing various pre-processing treatments on the little ancestor in his hand, Chen Luo was also carefully examining every internal and external structure of the little ancestor—ahem, that is, Book of Fuxi.
As a puppeteer, how could he possibly ignore an ELF, an ELF entirely at his mercy?
Although Chen Luo indeed possessed the ability to modify artificial lifeforms thanks to Mobius's scalpel, which allowed him to create ELFs.
Theory is one thing; practice is another.
And Chen Luo spent a full half-hour just on this observation.
"A'Luo, are you sure you can do this? You've been fondling that sphere for over half an hour." The Herrscher of Sentience, who had finally reached a truce with the little fox over a piece of roasted meat, watched idly from the side.
To be honest, the Herrscher of Sentience thought her standoff with the little fox was boring enough, but she didn't expect Chen Luo to be even more boring, caressing that sphere for over half an hour.
"What do you know? I'm using my furniture mastery ability to grasp its blueprint." Chen Luo looked at the Herrscher of Sentience with the expression one might use on an illiterate person.
If Fu Hua didn't know how to replace the battery, that meant the Herrscher of Sentience didn't know how either, so both the Herrscher of Sentience and Fu Hua were illiterates in this regard.
"Blueprint? What's the use of that?"
"After mastering the target's blueprint, it's like fully understanding its construction. This makes repairs and manufacturing much more convenient. In other words, given sufficient conditions, I could even completely recreate another Book of Fuxi, an almost identical Book of Fuxi."
"It's like how I spent the previous period holding the Third Divine Key and eventually parsed its blueprint. Now, I can even use Void Archives to recreate a Book of Fuxi."
"Oh, right, speaking of Void Archives, it seems Void Archives has finished its upgrade." While explaining to the Herrscher of Sentience, Chen Luo remembered this and looked at his talent panel.
According to the display on the talent panel, Void Archives had indeed succeeded and was just waiting for Chen Luo to claim it.
However, Chen Luo looked at the claim button but hadn't pressed it yet, because he felt that if he pressed the claim button, he wouldn't be able to focus calmly on repairing Book of Fuxi. What if he ended up damaging Book of Fuxi because of it?
The strength and combat power of Book of Fuxi aren't important; what matters are the millennia of memories it shared with Fu Hua—that's the most crucial thing.
It's precisely because the storage device for these memories hasn't been operational for so long that Chen Luo went to such great lengths, spending so much time cleaning and warming up Book of Fuxi, just to avoid damaging them.
Otherwise, how hard do you think it is to just plug in a battery?
"So, can you fix it now?" the Herrscher of Sentience asked as she pulled a bag of potato chips from her storage ring.
"Ying ying ying!"
"You want some too? No way."
"..." Chen Luo temporarily ignored the complex dynamics between the Herrscher of Sentience and the little fox, focusing his attention back on Book of Fuxi.
As Chen Luo stopped rotating the sphere, the Honkai Crystal in his other hand was compressed into a very small, specially shaped black [battery].
Getting Book of Fuxi to wake up perfectly intact required considerable effort—like perfectly matching the [battery model], for instance.
"Well, it's time to start the repairs." Chen Luo looked at Book of Fuxi before him and licked his lips.
Honestly, if this ELF weren't Book of Fuxi, Chen Luo would have turned it into his own puppet long ago.
After all, even though it's a non-combat type ELF, the Flame Circle is no joke. It has sufficient combat power, enough intelligence, ample support capabilities, and most importantly, it's plenty cute.
Let's be reasonable—as a traveler, how can you not have your own Paimon?
The key point is its current state. To make an inappropriate analogy, it's like a billion-dollar mansion with its doors wide open, surveillance cameras powered down, the owner having taken sleeping pills, and a thief walking right in.
Little ancestor, my little ancestor. Hehehe...
* * *
"Ah, I slept so soundly..." A small, adorable voice rang out as a tiny puppet sitting on a sphere stretched lazily.
"Blockhead... what's for dinner tonight?" The little puppet rubbed its eyes before opening them, still somewhat bleary.
"Wah! Who are you?" But the first thing Book of Fuxi saw upon opening its eyes was a huge face extremely close to its own.
Instinctively, Book of Fuxi threw a punch at the face, but Chen Luo quickly dodged.
"Hello, Book of Fuxi." Chen Luo greeted it with a smile.
Even though he'd been handling it for a long time, this was Chen Luo's first proper look at it after successfully waking it up.
"Young master, who are you?" Book of Fuxi looked at Chen Luo warily.
Book of Fuxi sensed a kind of danger from Chen Luo—a level of threat akin to bloodline suppression.
"Let me introduce myself. I'm Chen Luo." Chen Luo extended his hand toward the tiny Book of Fuxi.
"Hmm, Blockhead, you're here? I called you earlier, but you didn't answer." But Book of Fuxi had no intention of listening to Chen Luo's chatter. When it looked around and saw the Herrscher of Sentience sitting on the sofa, it quickly manipulated the sphere it was sitting on and flew over.
If possible, Book of Fuxi didn't want to be alone with Chen Luo.
The feeling of bloodline suppression wasn't pleasant at all.
The Herrscher of Sentience, sitting on the sofa, heard Book of Fuxi's voice and waved back cheerfully in greeting.
For the Herrscher of Sentience, who had become Fu Hua, her feelings toward Book of Fuxi were also quite unique.
But just as Book of Fuxi was about to reach the Herrscher of Sentience, it suddenly found it couldn't move.
Book of Fuxi looked down and saw several thin threads wrapped around its body at some unknown time.
"Eh, what's this..." Before Book of Fuxi could figure out the situation, it flew back uncontrollably to Chen Luo's side.
And Book of Fuxi saw the threads extending from Chen Luo's hand, controlling it.
"Blockhead, save me!" Book of Fuxi instantly shouted.
"Ah, little ancestor, don't worry. I mean you no harm. I just need to check if there's any damage on you. After sleeping for a thousand years, you really need a thorough physical check-up upon waking up."
Chen Luo didn't retract the threads in his hand, but they seemed to be taken over by something, floating in the air around them, pulling on Book of Fuxi's body to keep it from moving recklessly. Meanwhile, Chen Luo's hand also reached out and touched Book of Fuxi.
"Sleep? A thousand years? I... I remember now. It seems I ran out of energy and... Wait, what are you doing? Don't come any closer!"
Because the memories were too distant, it took a moment to recall what exactly had happened.
But also because of that brief moment of distraction, Chen Luo's wicked hands successfully reached Book of Fuxi.
Book of Fuxi wanted to resist but was no match for Chen Luo at all.
Book of Fuxi wanted to call for help, but that Blockhead just stood there, showing no intention of saving it.
Book of Fuxi fell into despair. Book of Fuxi was going to turn dark!
"I'm... I'm not clean anymore..." After Chen Luo finally let go of Book of Fuxi, satisfied, Book of Fuxi lay on the sphere, sobbing and crying.
"Alright, stop pretending, little ancestor. You should have realized I was just checking your bodily functions, right?" Chen Luo said to Book of Fuxi after brushing off non-existent dust from his hands.
"...Just who are you?" Book of Fuxi glanced at the still unmoved Blockhead beside them before looking back at Chen Luo.
Chen Luo's inspection just now was very professional, reminding Book of Fuxi of its creators, Fuxi and Nuwa. The techniques Chen Luo mastered shouldn't belong to the current civilization but rather to a high-level scientist from the previous civilization.
Perhaps that's why the Blockhead turned a blind eye to its predicament?
"Oh, let me introduce myself again. I am Chen Luo, the one who inherited the [Nuwa · Puppeteer] Stigmata. Therefore, I am quite knowledgeable in the art of puppet manipulation." Chen Luo said, placing a hand on his chest.
"Huh? Wait, what did you say? Stigmata? Nuwa?" Book of Fuxi seemed to have heard something unbelievable.
Nuwa could have a Stigmata passed down?
"It's the Stigmata [Nuwa · Puppeteer]." Chen Luo emphasized while making the Stigmata appear on the back of his hand, then extended it toward Book of Fuxi.
Looking at the vermilion Stigmata and sensing the unfamiliar yet familiar aura emanating from it, Book of Fuxi couldn't help but gently touch it with its small hand.
"It's actually... really Nuwa's aura." Although somewhat unbelievable, the evidence was right before its eyes.
"And it's precisely because of this Stigmata that the Immortal Phoenix entrusted me to restore your energy source. Simply put, to recharge you."
Chen Luo pointed to the Herrscher of Sentience, who was now standing two meters away, quietly watching the two of them.
"Blockhead, I missed you so much. These thousand years... you've suffered a lot, haven't you?" Book of Fuxi threw itself into the Herrscher of Sentience's arms.
After all, it was a reunion after a thousand years. Although Book of Fuxi didn't have a strong sense of the passage of time, it could still feel that it had been asleep for a very long time.
However, this time, it was absolutely only to care for the Blockhead's feelings that it acted this way.
It definitely wasn't because it couldn't help itself.
Definitely not!
Hmm, the Blockhead's chest is still as flat as ever.
Such a strange and awkward sense of reassurance.
[Ding! Commission Completed]