Li Ang frowned, looking at the newly-unlocked Face-Changing Mask in his inventory.
The mask was oval-shaped, with a smooth, flawless surface and circular notches on the edges, likely for threading to secure it. Made of wood, its surface was painted a deep, ink-black, capable of covering the entire face, including the chin and forehead.
Li Ang paid and left the Pork Intestine Vermicelli Shop, then returned home to test the Face-Changing Mask.
Unlike the Cat's Eye, this piece of equipment didn't consume spiritual power when worn. As soon as the inside of the mask touched his facial skin, the black paint on the outside rapidly faded, replaced by an array of bizarre patterns: Tiger, Kamen Rider, a cute bunny-eared girl, Monkey King Sun Wukong, a golden toilet seat, pink fluffy lady slippers...
After playing around for about fifteen minutes, Li Ang finally confirmed that aside from being fun for cosplay, the Face-Changing Mask's first special effect truly had no practical use whatsoever. Though Li Ang did quite enjoy cosplay.
As for its second special effect, Li Ang specifically went to a comic convention happening in Yin City that afternoon to test it out. The results were quite pleasing. When he chose to reduce his presence, people around him would naturally ignore him as long as he stood still. Even if he walked around casually, others found it difficult to form an impression of him—even when he wore an extremely conspicuous mask. When he chose to enhance his presence, no matter what Li Ang did—even just standing still—he quickly attracted others' attention. Random impressions like "That masked weirdo is creepy," or "There's a weirdo here, should we call the police?" emerged among onlookers.
Li Ang quickly figured out other applications for the mask: assassination, infiltration, concealment, eavesdropping, and... blatant voyeurism.
According to Li Ang's speculation, the strength of the Face-Changing Mask was likely related to an observer's Perception Attribute; the higher their Perception Attribute, the better they could resist the mask's disorienting effects.
In any case, acquiring a useful piece of equipment was a good thing. Li Ang put the mask back into his inventory and continued searching for triggerable tasks around Yin City.
In the following days, apart from the arrival of a young and beautiful new female homeroom teacher at school, everything was uneventful. Li Ang waited serenely for a message regarding a delivery from a popular online marketplace.
"Your package has arrived at Yin City's New East Road. Delivery Person Zhang [Redacted] is currently dispatching it for you."
For a novice, acquiring cost-effective equipment is always the best way to quickly improve strength. As long as you find the right channels, you could arm yourself to the teeth with less than ten thousand monetary units.
Li Ang had previously purchased items from a popular online marketplace that included laboratory equipment, chemical fertilizers, seamless steel tubes, Bulletproof Vests, and Camping Hatchets. These products didn't seem problematic when viewed separately, but when purchased by the same person, they could easily be flagged by the official internet big data monitoring system. Therefore, Li Ang used different online shopping accounts, IP addresses, personal information, and phone numbers for his purchases to ensure he couldn't be traced, sending all the products to different addresses in Yin City. Although he had to rent a tricycle to go back and forth picking up all the packages, it was all worth it.
Li Ang swiftly unboxed all the packages in his living room and started his little DIY project. As an uncertified, self-taught genius, Li Ang considered his own level of knowledge, motivation, execution, and creativity to be top-notch.
At eleven or twelve, while his peers were obsessed with blowing up feces with firecrackers or blasting fish with water cannons, Li Ang was different. By studying Soviet militia manuals, he had already mastered infantry techniques. These included marksmanship, firearm maintenance, assassination, landmine deployment, direction finding, distance measurement, and the production, preservation, and transport of flammable and explosive materials. Blowing up feces with firecrackers was nothing compared to the thrill of detonating a remote-controlled soda can bomb packed with steel balls and iron fragments.
At thirteen or fourteen, while his peers were engrossed in cartoons and TV dramas, Li Ang delved into Soviet war epics. Through them, he mastered artillery techniques, including artillery maintenance, artillery troop deployment, coordinated actions, tactical command, fire support coordination, and the organization and employment of firepower.
By fifteen or sixteen, when most of his peers were experiencing the first stirrings of love and adolescent fantasies, Li Ang was already exploring the open-source internet. He had read the complete series of United States Army Doctrine Publications (ADP), United States Army Doctrine Reference Publications (ADRP), United States Field Manuals, and United States Army Technical Publications. He also studied a CIA operative capability development handbook and CIA interrogation manuals.
He was skilled in jungle guerrilla warfare and urban CQB (Close Quarters Battle). He could interrogate prisoners at Guantanamo or battle drug lords in Mexico. His supposed talents even extended to polishing atomic bombs, maintaining nuclear submarines, disassembling missile engines, cleaning satellite surfaces at high altitudes, and repairing airplane rearview mirrors...
His surname was Li, his given name Ang; he was truly a man of talent.
The internet is humanity's most advanced and powerful invention. It carries the bulk of our species' accumulated wisdom, from ancient times to the present, akin to the legendary 'One Piece'—cherished and invaluable.
Philosophy, economics, law, education, literature, art, history, mathematics, physics, chemistry, engineering, agronomy, medicine... All of human wisdom resides within this invisible, intangible network.
What's more amazing is that it is open-source, open, and without barriers. Anyone can access it without being excluded due to differences in lineage, place of origin, ethnicity, culture, or other such differences.
Acquiring knowledge has never been easier. With willpower and drive, anyone can leverage the internet's vast resources to become an expert in their chosen field. It's just that most people choose not to.
Li Ang stood in his cluttered living room. Using various machine tools, including a small stamping press, along with steel balls, steel wires, steel pipes, and other miscellaneous steel components he had purchased from a popular online marketplace, he set to work. After dozens of hours, he had manufactured components such as the selector switch, single-shot and full-auto sears, hammer, receiver, gas piston, and barrel. He then assembled these parts into a Kalashnikov assault rifle.
He crafted the metal magazine and over seventy copper-cased bullets himself.
Li Ang lifted the Kalashnikov assault rifle, renowned for its stability and reliability, inhaled the strong scent of metal, and pursed his lips. Still a bit rusty...
In a village on the Barbayang Border, a three-person family workshop could produce over twenty Kalashnikovs a month while still managing their farm work. And their equipment wasn't even as good as the items Li Ang bought from an online marketplace.
After finishing the Kalashnikov, Li Ang worked overtime. Using simple materials such as steel needles, steel balls, light bulbs, pig intestines, soda cans, and chemical fertilizers, he made more than a dozen improvised explosive devices (IEDs).
These soda-can-sized IEDs were wrapped in copious amounts of transparent tape. Finger-length steel nails bristled outwards, looking both menacing and terrifying. Moreover, they looked incredibly crude, giving off an unstable and dangerous aura, as if ready to detonate at any second.
"Looks crude, but packs a punch. The uglier the weapon, the deadlier it is," Li Ang reassured himself.
Li Ang began to equip himself. He donned a steel helmet, the Face-Changing Mask, and slipped the Cat's Eye into his eye sockets. He wore a CQB Tactical Bulletproof Vest and Anti-Stabbing Tactical Pants, then stepped into rubber Tactical Boots, a sharp folding knife concealed inside one of them.
He wore a camouflaged backpack crammed with IEDs. A high-intensity flashlight and a Camping Hatchet hung from his waist. His tactical-gloved hands gripped the Kalashnikov assault rifle.
At this moment, Li Ang was fully armed. Taking into account his psychological fortitude, physical fitness, and combat expertise, his overall combat effectiveness was roughly equivalent to ten similarly equipped members of a Mexican cartel, or twenty child soldiers from Black Africa.
Just as Li Ang was admiring his outlandish gear in the mirror, a System prompt sounded in his ear.
[Condition Met: Player status maintained for 240 hours total]
[Scripted Mission Module Unlocked]
[Mission Type: Scripted Mission]
[Mission Name: Hungry Limit]
[Mission Objective: Eliminate Zombie in Hidden Mountain Village 0/1]
[Mission Time Limit: 3 hours]
[Reward 1: Bonus Experience Points upon eliminating mission target(s)]
[Reward 2: 200 Game Coins]
[Reward 3: Random Skill Scroll (Rare Quality) x1]