Chapter 277: Unbreakable Record
Translator: flycrane01 Editor: Millman97
After passing through five floating stone belts, the plate armor of ALKAID had all dropped off, revealing the perfect, streamlined shell.
It was not until then that much of the audience realized that this mysterious driver was driving the same model of super shuttle as Battle Axe Guan Dong had, the ALKAID!
What's more, the shell of this ALKAID also had an inlay of auxiliary fins that looked like shark fins.
However, the fins were much fewer than those on the previous ALKAID. Also, they looked somewhat awry on the shell of the vehicle.
At first glance, they unmistakably brought the feeling that not only would they fail to stabilize the super shuttle, they would also stir the chaotic wind into a more chaotic one.
As it turned out, ALKAID lost the smoothness that it'd had in the beginning and started trembling.
"What's the meaning of this?"
"Even as a layman, I can tell that the distribution of the auxiliary fins is completely against aerodynamics. They're messed up!"
"The previous modification was so brilliant. Why would he modify his super shuttle in such a way towards the end? It will do better without these auxiliary fins!"
All the super shuttle fans were gazing at the light beams with their full attention while pondering the reason.
Even Fiend Fire Lu Feng and Battle Axe Guan Dong were looking at each other in confusion.
They'd been in countless super shuttle races. Never once had they seen such bizarre modification. They had no clue what its purpose was at all.
Jiang Shaoyang and Mei Ze, who were in the maintenance workshop, both dropped their work and rushed out to study Li Yao's ALKAID.
Li Yao's performance in the beginning was already shocking enough for them, especially for Jiang Shaoyang, who thought he had explored all possibilities in the optimization of the ALKAID. He'd never expected that someone could modify an ALKAID that was even more crazy and brutal than his.
Manipulating forty sails at the same time in tornadoes to borrow the power of wind was not a skill that every super shuttle driver could handle.
Therefore, no modification master had ever realized that a super shuttle could be modified in such a way!
But the crooked, disordered auxiliary fins caused them greater confusion.
Mei Ze opened his mouth and asked, "Shaoyang, can you tell the function of the auxiliary fins?"
Him speaking first was a sign that he had admitted that Jiang Shaoyang was better than him in the field of super shuttle modification.
The corners of Jiang Shaoyang's eyes twitched violently. The annular eclipse tattoo on his forehead seemed to be enlivened and turned into a swirl that was too deep to measure.
After pondering for a moment, his eyes bulged wide, as he realized what was going on. He couldn't help but shout, "No! It's impossible!"
Right then, Li Yao encountered the sixth floating stone belt.
"Bad luck!"
The super shuttle fans all sighed for him.
Luck played an important role on the Hell Storm Racetrack.
If a driver was lucky and just came across three or four sparse floating stone belts, it would be very easy to get a good result.
However, if a driver was unlucky and ran into five or six floating stone belts, he might be caught by the scattered stones by accident even if he was a professional driver.
Today, it seemed that Li Yao was the unlucky driver.
The stones in the sixth floating stone belt were dense and sharp. They were colliding with each other and splitting into smaller stones without any pattern all the time.
The ALKAID had run out of the plate armor. Its spiritual shield was much duller than before after the tremendous consumption.
Its defense ability had hit rock bottom.
A scattered stone the size of a fist would be enough to crash it.
A large-scale ambulance airship was already standing by and ready to move out.
Everyone was anxious for what was to come.
Right then—
Inside the ALKAID, every one of Li Yao's brain cell started roaring together with the power rune array that had been boosted to maximum.
Flow of wind, point of impact of the stones, parameters of every component of the super shuttle…
Every factor was taken into account inside his brain and turned into a series of obscure figures and formulas.
Like a volcano eruption, Li Yao's brain went into the super perceptive state!
Brain cell activity, 300%!
The ALKAID trembled so violently that it started revolving in the end.
With the high-speed rotation of more than a hundred circles per second, the ALKAID seemed to have become a screaming bullet, or a drill that was going to dig into the sky. The scattered stones were blown away by the centrifugal force the moment they hit the shell of the ALKAID.
It was not until then that the audience discovered the true use of the auxiliary fins.
In a normal state, the auxiliary fins were indeed crooked and messed-up and would be a nuisance in the racing.
However, in the state of high-speed rotation, the auxiliary fins turned into propeller blades that could not only help stabilize the trajectory of ALKAID, but also knock off the smaller stones that had come close to the super shuttle.
"The modifier had all this in mind?"
"It's impossible! Rotating at such a high speed while adjusting the course of the super shuttle at a subsonic speed, even a Building Foundation Stage Cultivator wouldn't be able to do that!"
"Who is he?"
Every audience was asking the same question.
"Who is he?"
The two ace drivers clenched their hands, their faces flushed due to anxiety.
They couldn't figure out which super shuttle driver could be freakish like this.
Judging from his driving style in the beginning, he seemed to be a professional player. However, no professional player would ever waste their time practicing such a weird skill as high-speed rotation.
It was a skill only suitable for flying in tornadoes. On a professional racetrack, it would be completely useless!
"Where is this weirdo from?"
The two ace drivers looked at each other and smiled bitterly.
They thought they were the protagonists of the day. Now, they had become stepping stones for somebody else.
"Who is he?" Mei Ze was murmuring at the same time.
Jiang Shaoyang squinted, his mouth shivering,
"Such out-of-mind modification style reminds me of a certain someone. However, where on earth did he find such an insane driver to drive for him?
"No, not a driver.
"The driving skills the guy showed are far beyond the scope of super shuttle racing. He must be more than a professional super shuttle driver.
"He is an Exo, and not just any Exo. A first-rate one!
"What he has been using are the brilliant acrobatic skills of a crystal suit!"
In everyone's bewilderment and exclamation, Li Yao drilled through the sky like a bullet from a sniper rifle and crushed the record just created by Battle Axe Guan Dong into pieces.
Seeing the blood-like timer slowly appearing on the light beam, nobody was able to calm themselves down for a long time. They found what had happened dramatic and inconceivable.
The commentator had lost the ability to talk, too. There was a long silence on the spot.
10'32''55!
Li Yao had broken the lap record of the Hell Storm Racetrack by an earthshattering 1 minute and 11 seconds!
…
After the game, Li Yao didn't let anybody know his name. He didn't even talk with the four experts under the identity of 'Fang Ping'.
He left the arena the moment the match was completed.
One of the reasons was that he feared Jiang Shaoyang might've found out who he was. But more importantly, he felt that his victory was kind of cheating.
The methodologies in his modification of ALKAID lay far beyond the studies of the super shuttle. The helical acceleration that he employed towards the end of the game was not a super shuttle driving skill at all.
Such modification and such a technique were suitable for himself and for the Hell Storm Domain exclusively.
If it were on a different racetrack or a different Exo, the result would've been the complete opposite of the current one.
There was not a second Exo in the entire Heaven's Origin Sector who had been slashing tornadoes in dust storms crazily like himself.
He was confident to beat any enemy, even a Building Foundation expert, in a tornado.
But on the other hand, Jiang Shaoyang's modification ideas were the rightful paths that were universally applicable to any super shuttle driver and any racetrack.
Therefore, in the field of the super shuttle modification, he had lost a battle.
"Solar Eclipse Jiang Shaoyang? Good for you!
"After only three months, you've made such enormous progress! Given another few years, you might actually be able to eclipse the Novem Stellae!
"No. The Novem Stellae, the Supernova, these experts are all mine!
"I will beat them faster than you do!"
Stimulated by Jiang Shaoyang, Li Yao competitiveness was burning brighter and brighter like a fire that had just had oil added onto it.
His disappearance without saying goodbye made the super shuttle fans of Serpent City even crazier about him.
Within a few hours, the news had spread to every corner of the city.
"A mysterious driver savaged the Hell Storm Racetrack with a crazily modified ALKAID!"
"Fiend Fire Lu Feng and Battle Axe Guan Dong, two well-known drivers, have been defeated shamefully!"
"1 minute and 11 seconds! This is a lap record that is never going to be broken again!"
"Who is he exactly? Is he one of the top five super shuttle drivers of the federation who joined the competition in disguise?"
The fact that he had become a center of public attention caused a minor trouble for him.
He was now in the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion's trade fair of unknown materials and defective materials.
In case anyone recognized him, he wore a glittering silver mask besides his previous pretense.
It was not something unusual in Serpent City.
Most of participants of the trade fair did not intend for other people to learn of their real identities. Therefore, the trade fair had pretty much become a masquerade.
Those without masks might not be showing their true faces, either.
For example, although Li Yao had been with Yuan Qi for three days, he was not sure that the Yuan Qi he saw and heard was Yuan Qi's true face and voice.
There was nothing special about the trade fair itself.
Before he went to the trade fair, he'd fantasized about picking up some Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures by chance that were overlooked by other people.
As it turned out, he had been thinking too much.
The Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures allegedly from other worlds were all weird and beyond recognition of attributes or usage. Li Yao found no useful material even with the help of the probe technique of the Hundred Smelting Clan from 40,000 years ago.
However, he did find several useful ingredients from the defective materials. Although they had been damaged due to various reasons and wouldn't be of much use to other refiners, he might be able to revive them with the secret technique of the Hundred Smelting Clan.
Therefore, Li Yao spent a fortune on a batch of defective materials and quite enjoyed the feeling of being rich, however briefly.
Besides that, two other interesting things happened in the trade fair, which educated Li Yao on the craziness of 'treasure gambling'.